


THIRTEEN

by maggient13



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: pyrokinesis, set in 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2020-01-12 15:49:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 36
Words: 69,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18449711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maggient13/pseuds/maggient13
Summary: Nearly 34 years after Hawkins Lab was closed and 18 years after El went missing, a stranger appears in town. Lucas Sinclair, 46 years old and living alone in Hawkins, finds himself facing his past, as a girl with an all too familiar tattoo asks for his help. The girl is angry, alone, and determined to find her family.





	1. The Daughter

Lucas’s alarm went off at 6:45am, just like every morning. He rolled onto his stomach, reaching blindly to his nightstand for his phone. Once he had hit the snooze button on his phone, he was immediately drifting back to sleep, his arm hanging limply over the side of his bed. But that freedom was short-lived, and soon the phone was blaring again. Lucas grabbed his phone, scrolling sleepily through the various news and social media apps, trying desperately not to fall back to sleep.

  
Eventually, he sat up and looked out the window. It was now 7:23, and the sunrise was reflecting a soft orange light over his curtains. Lucas stood up and walked to his closet. He rooted around inside until he decided on a white button-up shirt, a tan pair of pants, and a nice amber-colored tie.

  
After getting dressed, Lucas shuffled into his kitchen. He poured coffee into his thermos and leaned against the counter, looking at the calendar stuck to his fridge and waiting for his coffee to cool down. The date was Friday, April 13, 2018, and like most days, there was an empty square on Lucas’s calendar. He took a sip of the hot coffee and set it down, leaving a small dark ring on the countertop while Lucas finished getting ready for work. Lucas had worked as a police officer for over ten years, but had decided to quit in 2010 to go work a simple office job.

  
At work, Lucas just tried to get through the day. This wasn’t as exciting as police work, but it was much easier and it definitely paid better. At least it was Friday, and he had a weekend of rest to look forward to. Once 5:00 hit, Lucas put on his coat and set off for the local bar, the Hideaway. Lucas went to the Hideaway almost every weekday, usually accompanied by some work friends. But today was Friday, and everyone had left early to go eat with their families, leaving Lucas alone.

  
Lucas didn’t have a family of his own to go eat with. He had gotten divorced in his thirties, and he had never had kids with his ex-wife. He didn’t miss her much, and instead preferred to ignore the short-lived relationship altogether. Lucas’s dad had died in 1998, and his mother was in a nursing home. He visited his mom over the weekends and after work most days, but they were more forced than fun. Lucas’s sister, Erica, had gotten married, moved out of Hawkins, and had three children. Lucas talked to her over the phone, but except for Christmas and occasional visits to check on her mother, Erica mostly kept to herself.

  
Lucas ordered his usual meal and a beer and absent-mindedly watched the various basketball games on the screens, even though he had stopped caring about sports years ago. After he finished his meal, Lucas drove home. He changed out of his work clothes and into his pajamas, an old t-shirt and his trusty maroon pajama pants. He slumped into his usual spot on the couch and turned the TV on. The screen’s cool white light fought with the warm light from the lamp on Lucas’s right.

  
On one particularly never-ending commercial break, Lucas scrolled through Twitter on his phone. Nancy Wheeler, now an investigative journalist, had posted her latest politically-charged article, which Lucas read in its entirety. As with most of the time, when Lucas reads one of Nancy’s articles, he starts reminiscing, and next thing he knows, he’s going through the facebook page of some random girl he knew in high school.

  
Lucas didn’t mind being alone, but he did miss having a group of close friends, solving mysteries and saving each other. Maybe he was romanticizing the past, but Lucas missed the days when he lived a Stephen King novel. The details were a little fuzzy, but Lucas imagined their adventures with fondness. Walking down the train-tracks, spying on Hawkins Lab, and using his Wrist-Rocket to fight monsters had made his young life interesting and colorful. Now, Lucas was the only person from his childhood who was left in Hawkins. His friends and family had left Hawkins years ago, taking the color with them.

  
A knock at the door startled him. He looked up from his phone to see the warped silhouette of a small boy through the window. Lucas went to the door, ready to tell the boy that he’s got the wrong house. Lucas pulled the door open, and immediately froze. It wasn’t a boy at all, it was a girl with short hair. She had freckles mixed with acne all over her face, a shaggy pixie cut, and brown eyes that Lucas could’ve sworn he’d seen before. She looked to be about sixteen or seventeen, but she had dark purple circles around her eyes and a fearful expression on her face that seem out of place on a face so young.

  
“Lucas Sinclair?” the girl asked. There was a look of determination on her face that cut through the fear in her eyes.  
“Uh, yeah?”

  
“Can I come in? I have to talk to you,” she said slowly. Lucas hesitated, and looked over her shoulder, trying to find the car that dropped her off. There was no car next to the road, just the same dimming streetlight that had been there since Lucas moved in.

  
“I guess,” Lucas replied, cautious, yet intrigued. The girl looked so scared, and his instincts were telling him to protect her. He invited her into the living room, where the TV was still on its commercial break, now featuring a car rolling luxuriously rolling along a mountain road. He muted it, and the room was overcome with a thunderous silence, somehow louder than the booming music from the car advertisement. The girl sat down uncomfortably on Lucas’s couch, with her eyes skipping around the room but not taking in any details. Lucas noticed her clothes, now illuminated and glowing in the lamp’s yellow light. It was a baggy sweater, several sizes too big, that looked older than the pajama t-shirt Lucas was wearing. She was wearing dark blue jeans, smeared with dirt and with large holes ripped in them that her small knees poked out of awkwardly. On her feet were two worn sneakers that were too small for her.

  
“I think you knew my parents,” the girl said suddenly, now staring directly at Lucas.

  
“Who-“ Lucas started, but suddenly froze again. He recognized the girl sitting in front of him. Her eyes are dark brown, and stared unblinking at him, with an intensity that Lucas had only seen once before. They are the kind but pained eyes of Eleven.


	2. The Flower

Lucas knew that he lived in the past, but couldn’t help himself. He wasn’t anyone’s hero anymore, and naturally longed for the days when he was the strongest friend in the group, with his Wrist-Rocket and camouflage bandana. He missed the mysteries that he helped solve. It was part of why he became a police officer, and it was what keeps him daydreaming about his old friend group and their adventures.

  
But there were a few people that Lucas didn’t dare think about anymore. El went missing in the year 2000, pregnant with her and Mike’s first baby. Mike was filled with grief, and left town. He didn’t tell anyone where he went and the note he left made it clear that he didn’t want to be found. It had been eighteen years since Lucas had seen their faces.  
But now, sitting on his couch, was a girl with Eleven’s eyes. Now Lucas noticed that she had her thin eyebrows, along with Mike’s nose, cheekbones, and pale skin. It was definitely their daughter, no question.

  
Lucas felt tears come to his eyes and a lump form in his throat. The girl looked sadly at him, but her determination seemed to block out even the idea of crying.

  
“Who was my mom?” The girl squeaked, nervously picking at the acne on her- Mike’s- cheek, with her hand swallowed by the sleeve of her cartoonishly oversized sweater.

  
“You don’t know?” Lucas asked.

  
“I know her name. Eleven. I know that she used to live in this town. But that’s all.” she replied. Lucas was quiet for another minute.

  
“We called her El for short,” he started. “We met her in the woods in 1983. Our friend, Will, had gone missing and we were looking for him, but found El instead. Mike took her back to his house and snuck her into the basement. She had a buzzcut, and a tattoo of the number eleven on her arm. And she didn’t talk much, so we thought she was crazy, and I just wanted to get back to finding Will. But it turns out she knew Will, somehow. El had powers. She was psychic, and she could move things with her mind,” Lucas looked at the girl’s face, waiting for signs of shock, but none came. He continued his story.

  
“Will was taken by a monster, into the Upside Down.” Now, the girl looked confused.  
“Upside Down?”

  
“Yeah. It’s another dimension- uh, another world, like ours, but cold, blue, and dark. I know, it sounds made-up, but it’s real. I’ve seen it,” Lucas shuddered.

  
“Okay,” said the girl, and nodded for Lucas to continue.

  
“So only El could sense that Will was in the Upside Down, because of her powers. And Will was able to talk to his mom, through the lights, which blinked when he was there. But then they found a dead body that looked like his, and we all thought El was a liar. She kept trying to tell us that he was alive, and she used her powers to channel his voice through a radio. We figured out what she was trying to tell us about the Upside Down, and I figured out that the gateway to it was in Hawkins Lab,” Lucas said, proudly.

  
“Hawkins Lab,” the girl repeated.

  
“Thats where El was from,” Lucas said quietly, pride fading quickly. “She was taken from her mom as a baby, and they did experiments on her, because she was special. She had abilities that no one else had. They wanted to use her powers, and to do that they hurt her. They hurt a lot of people, including El’s mom, your grandmother. El escaped because she opened the gate to the Upside Down- that’s how she knew about it- and in the chaos she got out of there. The bad men from the lab kept looking for her, so we kept her hidden.” The girl was staring sadly at the floor, clearly trying to process this. Lucas didn’t know what to say, so he kept going.

  
“And the monster that took Will was killing other people. Mike’s sister had a friend named Barb, and she was taken, like Will, but she didn’t make it out. And Hopper, the chief of police at the time, was investigating Will’s disappearance and found out about El, so we all starting working with him to save Will. Hopper and Will’s mom went into the Upside Down, to get Will out, and Mike’s sister, Will’s brother, and a kid named Steve all tried to fight the monster so it wouldn’t hurt them. And we- that’s Mike, El, Dustin, and me- were in the school, running from the bad men, and the monster cornered us. El stepped forward and used her powers on it. She killed the monster, but she disappeared too. We thought she was dead. For a year.”

  
Lucas sat in silence, thinking about how awful that one year was without Eleven, and how that was nothing compared to eighteen years without El or Mike. Eventually, Lucas collected himself and kept going.

  
“El was gone, but we got Will back. But he was… different. Even quieter than he already was, and acting weird. Over the next year, he kept having ‘episodes’ where he was back in the Upside Down for a second. He kept getting worse, and there was a new monster in the Upside Down that got him. It’s like he was possessed. He could see the monster’s memories, and he was forgetting who we all were. The monster was reaching into our dimension, and he made Will set all these monsters on people. He was taken over by it, and so we had to save him, again. To beat the monster, we had to close the gate that El had opened. And every time Will figured out where he was, the monster would set more monsters after the people around him. One of them killed Will’s mom’s boyfriend. It was really bad. And he figured out that he was at his house and we thought all the monsters were going to come after us, but instead, El walked through the door. We thought she was dead, but there she was. Mike was so relieved- we all were- but they were so close, and he was saying all this stuff about how he called her every night but she couldn’t respond. Turns out, the chief of police, Hopper, was taking care of her, all that time. See, when she killed the first monster, she woke up in the Upside Down, but she got out. And there were so many people after her that she had to hide in the woods, until Hopper found her. So we figured out a plan. Some of us would go burn the monster out of Will- yeah, burned. The monster liked the cold so to get him out of Will, they had to use all these heaters and stuff. Anyway, They went to do that, and me and Mike and some others went to set the parts of the Upside Down that were reaching into Hawkins on fire, to keep the monsters away from El, while she closed the gate, and trapped the monster inside, and then everything was fine.”

  
Lucas stopped there and looked at the girl. She was staring at one part of the carpet, hardly reacting to his story. When she noticed he was done talking, she looked up.

  
“What happened next?”

  
“Well, everything was fine for a while. El and Will were both safe, the lab was closed, and we got to be normal teenagers for a while. Mike and El dated for a while, but broke up once, for a few years. Then in the 90s, they got back together and everything was great for a while. They got married, and a few years later, El got pregnant, and her and Mike were so happy. They were scared, because they didn’t know how her powers or history would affect the baby, but happy. Then a few months later, El went missing, just disappeared. Mike left a note that he was leaving, and nobody's seen him since. I think his sister knows where he is, because she’s an investigative reporter, but she won’t tell us. Everyone left town, except for me,” Lucas finished. He took a deep breath and looked at the girl. “Okay, your turn. You have to tell me who you are, and where you’ve been all this time. Do you know where El- where your mother is?”

  
“I never met her,” she said dully. “But… I’m like her.”

  
Lucas stared at her.

  
“You mean, you have powers too?”

  
“Yes. Not the same ones, but yes.” She spoke with power hiding behind her small voice, holding her fiery ferocity back.

  
Lucas didn’t know what to say.

  
“What can you do?” he asked after a moment.

  
“I can show you,” the girl said. She got up and walked to the fireplace. She moved the small glass door to the side, and selected one fresh flower from the vase on the mantle. She set the flower carefully on top of the cold and charred log resting in the fireplace. Then, she stepped back two paces. She put both of her hands out and narrowed her eyes. She began shaking, and Lucas noticed himself shrinking back. The girl clearly wasn’t as powerful as El- at least not yet- and seemed to be struggling to use her alleged powers. After nearly a minute of waiting, the girl let out a quiet but powerful grunt, like she was holding back a yell, and a wave of power swept across the room. The lights began flickering wildly.

  
Lucas was trying to stare at both the girl and the flower, anticipation fluttering like a swarm of butterflies in his chest. His eyes flicking from the shaking girl to the still flower reminded him of flipping through TV channels. But soon, he noticed the flower moving, melting and drooping like it was wilting. A sudden crackle made Lucas jump. He watched the flower burst into flames. There was no doubt in his mind now. This was Eleven’s daughter.

  
He only stopped staring into the bright flames when he heard a thunk to his left. The girl had fallen to her knees, and was breathing heavily. Lucas rushed to her side. The girl’s head was bowed, and all Lucas could see was her forehead, which now had beads of sweat mixed in with her acne and freckles.

  
“Are you okay?” Lucas asked, concerned. He remembered how drained El got when she used her powers, but didn’t know how to comfort the girl in front of him. Her head tilted up at him, and he watched a single, perfect drop of blood fall from her nose into her open mouth. The girl finally had tears in her eyes, and was still shaking. She stared past Lucas and straight into the fire in front of her, looking more frightened than when she first knocked on Lucas’s door. Lucas left one comforting hand on her right shoulder, mimicking the way Hopper comforted El. Lucas and the girl knelt on the floor for a few minutes, still staring, mesmerized, at the fire.

  
Finally, the girl interrupted the stillness, by reaching her left hand up to wipe some of the blood from her nose. Lucas noticed a bit of charcoal on her palm, and a smudge resembling a handprint where her palm had been resting on the hardwood floor. The sleeve of her large sweater fell to her elbow, exposing part of her wrist. A bit of ink peeked out of the sweater sleeve, and Lucas’s stomach lurched.

  
“May I see your arm?” Lucas whispered. The girl nodded slightly, and held her now bloody hand out to Lucas. Lucas moved her sweater out of the way to reveal a horrifyingly familiar tattoo on her left wrist. It said 013.

Thirteen.


	3. Isn't This What You Wanted?

An hour had passed since Lucas saw the flower burst into flames. He had put the fire out and helped the girl into the kitchen, to wash her hands and face. He had heated up two cans of chicken noodle soup on the stove, and cut a few slices of bread. The girl had trouble eating, and only made it halfway through her bowl. Now, both bowls sat still and cold on the coffee table. Lucas had turned on _Jeopardy_ , and had given the girl a light blanket to comfort her. They had assumed their original positions on the couch, and though they pretended to watch _Jeopardy_ in silence, both were distracted. 

When Lucas noticed the girl yawning, he turned the TV off. He walked into the guest room and turned the light on, silent out of habit. The girl followed him, with her blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She stood in the doorway, and watched him tidy up the room. Lucas had the bad habit of using the room as a storage room, and now hastily moved some old workout equipment and several boxes into the closet. The girl’s eyes were caught on one particular box, containing old police equipment. It had a pair of handcuffs resting on it. Lucas kicked it into the closet and stacked a box of winter clothes on top.

“Okay, so you can sleep here tonight. Or longer if you need to.” The girl nodded her head. Lucas pointed to a nightlight in an outlet near the girl’s foot.

“There’s a nightlight there, if it gets dark in here. And you can turn this fan on if you get too hot. Sorry it’s so dusty in here. I don’t get a lot of visitors, only my sister and her family at Christmas.” The girl looked confused, perhaps at the word ‘Christmas’, but she didn’t ask what it meant.

“I like it in here,” the girl said quietly. She went and sat down on the bed, and smiled for the first time that night. Lucas smiled back kindly.

“I’m glad to hear that. The bathroom is just across the hall, and I should have a spare toothbrush and some toothpaste for you in the cabinet. My bedroom is just next door, so if you need anything you can come find me, okay?”

The girl nodded, but she looked so tired and so comfortable that Lucas was sure that she wasn't concerned with dental hygiene at the moment.

“Do you want the door open or closed? Or cracked?” Lucas asked, moving towards the hallway.

“Open,” she replied quickly. Again Lucas thought back to El, being too scared to change with the door closed on that first night. He felt a pang in his heart. He missed his friend. 

Lucas walked into his bedroom, flicking the light on like always. He plugged his phone into the charger like always. He brushed his teeth like always. He climbed into bed like always. But this wasn’t like any other day for him. Lucas was scared. He was scared to find out how the girl had gotten the 013 tattoo on her left wrist, when the lab had been closed for 34 years. He was scared that there must be a number 012 out there somewhere. He was scared that there could be some new monster out there, threatening the lives of the people he loved. He was scared of the abuse and pain that this girl had clearly been through, and he was scared that Eleven’s past had spread to her daughter and it would take her away too. 

Lucas rolled over and tried to block these thoughts out of his head, like he always did when memories of El and Mike came back to him. _Isn’t this what you wanted? To go back to the good old days, and try to solve mysteries and be a hero again?_ The voice in his head was right. He had wished for things to be back like they were in 1983. But Lucas was now remembering all the fear and pain of those days. He thought now about how he went through almost losing Will more than once. Losing El that first year, with the demogorgon. Fighting those monsters, mourning those lost friends, and trying to escape from those bad men had affected Lucas more than he cared to admit. And now, Lucas faced all that again, except without Eleven and Mike. And the idea of this new girl, Thirteen, likely facing her own monsters and going through all the pain Lucas was familiar with terrified him, and made him angry. To distract himself, Lucas scrolled through twitter on his phone until he couldn’t keep his eyes open, and finally drifted off to sleep.


	4. 013

The next morning, Lucas woke up to frost on his window. For a second, he completely forgot about Thirteen and the flower on fire. The only thought in his head was _why is there frost on the window in April?_ But all of a sudden, memories of the night before were burning in his mind, and he jumped out of bed as if it was on fire too. He walked into the guest room. Thirteen was awake and had the light on, along with the fan. She was sitting up, with a thermal shirt on, which she must have had on under the oversized sweater. The sweater was lying on the floor. 

“Good morning. Do you want breakfast?” Lucas asked her.

“Yes please,” she replied eagerly. She slipped out of the bed, and Lucas saw that she was wearing the same ripped jeans from last night, which he realized must have been very uncomfortable to sleep in. Lucas felt guilty for not considering that she would need a change of clothes.

The girl followed Lucas into the kitchen, and leaned against the counter, looking as tired as last night. Lucas went through his kitchen, listing off the various cereals, oatmeals, and Pop Tart flavors he had. He thought about how Eleven had loved Eggo waffles, and wandered instinctively to the fridge. He opened the freezer before he realized that he hadn’t bought Eggo’s since El went missing. He shut the freezer quickly, and opened the fridge. 

“How do pancakes sound?” 

“Good,” she said, although Lucas could tell from the look on her face that she had no idea what pancakes were. He picked up an egg and the jug of milk. He moved to the cupboard and picked out the containers of flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, and vegetable oil. Then, he reached into the back of the cupboard and pulled out a small bag of chocolate chips, that he seemed to have hidden from himself. Lucas measured and mixed the ingredients together, all from memory. His mother had taught him to make pancakes when he was a teenager, and Lucas had memorized the recipe. Lucas found himself narrating what he was doing for Thirteen. She watched, interested and hungry. 

“See, when the batter starts to get bubbles like this, that’s how you know when to flip the pancake,” Lucas explained. Thirteen hovered over his shoulder, but seemed to cower away from the heat of the stove. 

Soon, a stack of pancakes grew on each of their plates. Lucas brought out some butter and syrup, and the two sat at the kitchen table and began their feast. Lucas imagined that the girl would be starving, since she had barely touched her soup last night. However, she only made it through half of her plate before she began to push the fallen chocolate chips around the plate with her fork. Lucas finished eating and sat back in his chair.

“Okay, so now you have to explain where you’ve been. You don’t have to tell me everything right away, but you have to at least tell me who’s been taking care of you, and how you found me. And if someone’s out there looking for you, or you’re not safe, or whatever happened, I need to know about it,” Lucas told the girl. She continued pushing her food around with her fork. Finally, she pushed her plate away and looked up at him. She remained silent.

“What’s your name?” Lucas started, knowing the answer, but waiting for her to say it herself.

“Thirteen,” she said softly.

“Where are you from?” Lucas asked quickly, eager to keep the conversation going, but scared to know the answer.

“Scary,” Thirteen said, even quieter. She avoided his eyes again. Lucas thought back to a young Eleven, speaking in one-word sentences.

“Why was it scary?” Lucas asked. The girl stared at the floor, and stayed quiet for a few seconds, thinking.

“It was really hot. No windows,” Thirteen mumbled.

“Were there more kids there?” _Like 012…_ Lucas thought about the missing number between eleven and thirteen, and wondered if he had another kid to go rescue.

“No, just me.”

“Okay, we’ll start small. Where did you live? Can you describe it for me?”

As she described the rooms she’d been kept in for eighteen years, Thirteen found herself vividly imagining every little stain on the wall, nick on the bedpost, and rip in her old clothes.

The room had been fairly big, but it had seemed somehow both massive and cramped to Thirteen. With such little furniture, there had been room for her to pace back and forth freely, something she did daily. The walls were light blue, almost white, and the grey, cement floor was cracked and would occasionally flood. A small, metal, overworked heater was tucked into a corner of the room, constantly making some kind of unpleasant noise.

Since she was five, Thirteen had slept on an old twin bed with a creaky, wooden frame. Her sheets were originally a nice white color, but with time they had faded into a pale yellow. On another wall, there was a small table and two chairs. A lamp sat on the edge of the table, plugged in to the only outlet in the room. Between the bed and the table was a set of file cabinets, containing Thirteen’s clothes and what little hygiene products she had. The only clothes she had were four simple dresses, shapeless, itchy, and a navy blue color that Thirteen grew to despise. She had no socks, sweaters, or jackets, and her one set of pajamas were as ripped and worn as her bed sheets. 

There were two doors and no windows in Thirteen’s room. One remained locked, only for her captor to use, and the other was to Thirteen’s bathroom. It had the same cement floors as the other room, but its walls were roughly painted. A thin, patchy coat of a sandy, orange color attempted to disguise the migraine-inducing, bright blue color that peeked out in places. The sink had been broken for as long as Thirteen could remember, only spitting out a trickle of scalding hot water, never cold. The shower was poorly installed as well, and had a very persistent drip that Thirteen could never fix. The toilet matched the sink, old and yellowed. One cerulean towel sat damp and unfolded on the top of the toilet, and a glass bottle of soap balanced on top of the sink, always threatening to fall.

When she was younger, Thirteen had been given dolls and other toys. They were well-loved by Thirteen, especially her toy lion, creatively named ‘Lion’. As a kid, Her captor had taught her to walk and speak, read books to her, and brought her meals. A young Thirteen had been dependent on her captor, but was never close with her. At the end of each day, the woman would leave the room, and Thirteen would hear the lock click as she was left alone.

Lucas sat back in his chair, after hearing Thirteen’s detailed description of the room. The girl was staring at her plate for the entire time she spoke, and Lucas felt a hollowness in her words, as if she could explain what the room looked like, but she couldn’t explain what it felt like to live there.

“Can you tell me about the person who kept you there? The woman?” Lucas asked, gently but firmly. Thirteen nodded, still focusing her eyes on her plate. “What was her name?” Lucas sat forward in his chair, bracing himself to hear the name ‘Martin Brenner’.

“Dr. Taylor,” Thirteen shuddered. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to block out the terror she felt, but Lucas was puzzled. He sat back in his chair, trying desperately to recognize the name. Lucas had memorized the names of everyone who had worked with Brenner in the lab, but Taylor was neither a first name nor a surname of any of them.

“Can you tell me more about her?”

Thirteen started describing her captor through shaky breaths. The face of the woman was burned in her mind: Aged, yet youthful, long blonde hair, glasses, blue eyes. She wore lab coats every day and carried her clipboard and keyring at all times. She spoke with an icy voice, clear yet unfeeling.

Lucas still couldn’t recall this woman. Was it possible that this kidnapping was unrelated to Eleven’s past? Lucas was about to ask Thirteen to explain what Dr. Taylor did to her, but Thirteen was already starting to tell him.

As a kid, Thirteen would wake up each morning. She would play with her toys and wait for Dr. Taylor to open the door. With no windows or clocks, Thirteen would wake up at any time, and then wait up to a few hours for Dr. Taylor. When she finally unlocked the door, Dr. Taylor would be carrying a tray of food for Thirteen. She would sit across from her at the table and watch her eat, occasionally making notes on her clipboard. The food was usually the unheated contents of a canned soup and a few raw vegetables, often spinach or broccoli, which Thirteen choked down unhappily. 

After eating, she would take her toothbrush, toothpaste, hairbrush, and a change of clothes to the bathroom. She would change into one of her dresses, brush her teeth and run the brush through her wavy brown hair. After that, the day was hers. She would play with her toys as Dr. Taylor watched. At a certain point, Dr. Taylor would call her back over to the table, and she would start the day’s lessons. She never bothered teaching her to read, only to count from one to thirteen. She was taught to speak, and Dr. Taylor would read to her.

From a young age, Dr. Taylor made it clear to her that she didn’t live a normal life. She would tell stories of what regular little girls did and what the outside world was like. Dr. Taylor would present her with pictures of trees, animals, cars, and buildings, which seemed magical to the young girl.

Thirteen knew she was stuck in the room. Each morning, she would watch as the door opened, trying to get a peek behind Dr. Taylor at the outside world. Each night, as Dr. Taylor left, she would hear the lock click, as cold and unfeeling as her captor. She was never allowed to leave that room, never able to speak to another person, and never was given a name. That was, until she turned ten.  
On her tenth birthday, Thirteen woke up like any other day and played with her toys as normal. She had no idea what a birthday was. When Dr. Taylor stepped through the door, she was carrying a large machine with her, something that Thirteen had never seen. She left and came back with her arms full of things that were completely unfamiliar to Thirteen.

Dr. Taylor sat Thirteen in her chair and plugged a small device, a pair of hair clippers, into the outlet. It clicked on, and let out a loud buzzing noise that startled Thirteen. Dr. Taylor shaved off all of Thirteen’s hair, despite her tears and protests. After that, Dr. Taylor brought out a tattoo gun, and made Thirteen sit still as she tattooed a number onto her wrist.

“Do you remember how you always asked me if you had a name?” Dr. Taylor had asked her after she finished the tattoo.

“Yes. I don’t have one,” Thirteen said, wiping her tears away. She stared at the still-stinging tattoo, burning darkly on her skin.

“You do now. You are Thirteen,” Dr. Taylor had announced. Thirteen had stared at her tattoo, 013, red and painful, immediately loathing the only name she’d ever been given.


	5. The Burn

After she had been named, Dr. Taylor took away Thirteen’s toys, with as much compassion as she had when she took away her hair. Thirteen had begged her not to, but Dr. Taylor had tossed her beloved Lion into a box, never to be seen again.

Next was the hardest part. Dr. Taylor had placed a strange net over Thirteen’s head, with wires that connected to the machine. It made a whirring noise, moving a needle back and forth to mark Thirteen’s brainwaves. Dr. Taylor set a video camera on a tripod, which stared at the terrified Thirteen, blinking its red light angrily. Finally, Dr. Taylor set a can on the table. It was bright red, empty, and labeled with words that Thirteen couldn’t read. 

“Focus on it,” Dr. Taylor instructed. Scared, confused, and in pain, Thirteen couldn’t do it. Whatever it was that Dr. Taylor was asking her to do, Thirteen didn’t understand. When she insisted that she couldn’t do anything, Dr. Taylor took a cattle prod and shocked Thirteen.

That was how every day went. Dr. Taylor fed Thirteen less and less, and hurt her more and more. She would be hooked up to the brain wave monitor and told to focus on something. Nothing would happen, and Thirteen would be shocked. She would cry herself to sleep, terrified of her nightmares and longing for an ounce of the comfort she was denied. 

Thirteen took a break from her story. Lucas got her a glass of ice water, which the girl drank shakily. Lucas wasn’t sure that anything he could say would comfort her, so he sat in silence, trying to convince himself that everything would be okay.

After ten minutes of silence, Thirteen was ready to keep going. She told Lucas about the day that she first used her powers. She had been angry, fed up with Dr. Taylor’s abuse, and she reached a breaking point. And all of a sudden, the bag of chips that had been placed in front of Thirteen were on fire. Dr. Taylor had been overjoyed, and Thirteen had been left exhausted, with blood falling from her nose.

After that day, the tests got more intense. Sometimes, Thirteen would be able to set fires, and sometimes she would end the day with a shock from the cattle prod. Thirteen just wanted to escape, to run into the world with trees, and animals, and other kids. Her life had been full of pain for six years. Her head was repeatedly shaved, her powers were forced out of her, and Thirteen was stuck in the room night after night, sweating from the heat and shaking from her nightmares.

At some point after her sixteenth birthday, Thirteen had had enough. She focused her powers on Dr. Taylor instead of the rat that she had been instructed to burn. Years of torture and anger bubbled up inside of Thirteen like lava, and the sleeve of Dr. Taylor’s arm was set on fire.

Her captor had screamed in pain, and Thirteen had sat still, shocked by what she’d done. She snapped back to her senses as a drop of blood trickled down her lip. Thirteen had hopped to her feet and grabbed the keyring from Dr. Taylor’s pocket. She dodged Dr. Taylor and quickly unlocked the door in the same way that she had watched her captor unlock it every day for her whole life.

Thirteen threw the door open and ran through. Behind the door, a flickering light illuminated a set of stairs. Thirteen, who had never seen stairs before, scrambled up them clumsily, needing to get away from Dr. Taylor’s screams.

At the top of the stairs, Thirteen burst through another door. She found herself in a long hallway, with a white tiled floor and white cinderblock walls. Thirteen ran down the hallway, not stopping to process this sight. She threw open every door she could find, always revealing a copy of the same room. Behind each door was a small, dark room with desks and chairs strewn about. Colorful posters lined the walls and the only light came from the sun outside the windows. The sight of the grey skies and the vivid green trees through the windows were exciting to Thirteen, but she couldn’t stop to admire them. 

Thirteen tore through the building, trying to find the door that would lead to the outside world, but it wasn’t there. The screams of Dr. Taylor were getting closer, and Thirteen was chased into one of the empty rooms. She cowered underneath a desk, watching the cold breeze from a nearby open window scatter papers across the dusty floor.

When Dr. Taylor found Thirteen, she had shed her lab coat and had a bandage wrapped around her right arm. In her left hand, Dr. Taylor was holding apoker, red-hot and menacing. She had a violent look in her eyes, hungry and unstoppable. She lunged at Thirteen, grabbing onto her right arm. Holding her still, Dr. Taylor pressed the poker into her skin, not relenting at Thirteen’s screams.

A wave of heat flooded through the room, and Dr. Taylor was thrown off of Thirteen. The poker skidded across the floor, and Thirteen’s screams were drowned out by the sound of the room exploding into a blaze of fire. Thirteen passed out there, surrounded by flames.

Thirteen rolled up her sleeve to show Lucas the burn mark on her right arm. The mark seemed to swallow Thirteen’s arm, replacing her pale skin with apatch of a red, rough texture. Lucas choked back his tears again, still struggling to believe the pain that this girl had suffered. He wanted to hit himself for living his lazy, lonely life for so long while Thirteen was out there, needing rescuing.

“What happened next?” Lucas choked out, after the girl had fallen silent.

“I woke up in my bed. Dr. Taylor had put these… things on me,” Thirteen couldn’t find the words, and decided to simply show Lucas. She got up from the table and walked back through the house, not waiting for Lucas to follow her. He scrambled out of his chair and hustled after her, as she led the way into the guest bedroom. He found her standing next to the open closet, pointing at one of the boxes. 

“Those,” she said. He followed her finger, and picked up the pair of handcuffs that rested on top of the cardboard box labeled ‘police stuff’.

“She put these on you?” Lucas asked. The handcuffs seemed harmless to him, but Thirteen stared at them with fear and anger in her eyes.

Thirteen had been handcuffed to her bed for two years. She was allowed two bathroom breaks a day, but most of her time was spent on her bed. At first, Dr. Taylor was largely unchanged by Thirteen’s escape. She insisted on continuing the tests, and kept a fire extinguisher in the room. 

Thirteen, however, had started to give up. She would lay down, not moving or talking, and she accepted the cattle prod as an alternative to using her powers. She was terrified of her own fire. 

After some time passed, Dr. Taylor started to change her opinion on Thirteen. Instead of treating her like an experiment, she seemed to almost _care_ about her. She would speak calmly to her, bring her better food, and she even stopped shocking her with the cattle prod if she refused to use her powers. Dr. Taylor abandoned her hair clippers, allowing Thirteen to grow her hair out, little by little.

One day, Dr. Taylor woke Thirteen up with a loud clunking sound. She had dropped a large TV onto the table. Thirteen watched, confused and scared of the unfamiliar TV, as Dr. Taylor pushed a VHS tape into the VCR player.

A blue screen appeared on the TV. Thirteen watched, mesmerized, as the screen turned grey, displaying a picture of a young girl, younger than Thirteen, sitting at a table. The girl had a shaved head, just like Thirteen, and wore a wire device on her head, the same one that hooked Thirteen up to the brain wave monitor. In front of the girl was a red can, which Thirteen recognized as the same type of can that Dr. Taylor had placed in front of her, six years earlier. The numbers at the bottom of the screen read _AUG 2, 1983_. 

Thirteen watched as the girl on the screen sat forward, staring at the can. After a few unbearable seconds of anticipation, the red can crumpled in front of the girl, untouched. Thirteen gasped softly, feeling kinship with the girl, who was wiping blood from under her nose. The tape ended there, and Thirteen was full of questions.

“Who was that?” Thirteen asked, speaking to Dr. Taylor for the first time in days.

“That was Eleven. Your mother,” Dr. Taylor told her. After questions started pouring out of Thirteen, Dr. Taylor began telling stories about Eleven. At first, she only told Thirteen about the girl’s powers. But after weeks without questions, to stop Thirteen from going back to her silent existence, Dr. Taylor starting giving more details about Eleven.

She told Thirteen about her escape from the lab, and her betrayal of her Papa, the man who was trying to help her. She told her about Eleven going to live with a police officer, Chief Hopper. Dr. Taylor sneakily tried to paint Eleven as a misguided rebel, and Papa as a good man, but Thirteen saw through her tricks. Thirteen knew that Eleven had felt the same way she did, and escaping was the only thing on her mind.

Dr. Taylor refused to tell Thirteen where her mother was. Thirteen thought constantly about escaping from Dr. Taylor and finding Eleven. She had craved a family since she was a kid, but now that craving burned in her mind day and night. She had to escape.

And finally, she was given a chance. It was her first bathroom break of the day, and Thirteen had gone to wash her hands. The glass soap bottle that teetered on the edge of the sink slipped off, the way it had been threatening to since Thirteen could remember. After hitting the ground with a light crash, blue soap spilled over the broken glass. Thirteen bent to pick it up, ready to sweep it into the trash without a second thought, but she paused as she noticed the sharp edge of the glass. She prodded it with her finger, with a smile spreading over her face for the first time in over a year.

Thirteen brandished the glass shard in her hand, readying herself for her escape. With perfect timing, Dr. Taylor knocked on the door, calling for Thirteen to come back out. Thirteen threw the door open, swiping the glass at Dr. Taylor.

She caught her in the right arm, the same place where she had burned her a year earlier. Dr. Taylor fell to the floor, yelling out in pain. The glass shard stuck in her arm, and Thirteen watched blood pour out of the wound.

Without waiting to see how Dr. Taylor would react, Thirteen leapt over her body and made her escape. She climbed up the stairs and threw herself through the doorway and into the hall. This time, she didn’t busy herself with the doors. She tore down the hallway, feeling the adrenaline rush through her body. 

The building was a maze, and Thirteen felt herself start to panic as she turned the corners. It was as if she was running in circles, destined to end up in one of the rooms with another burn mark on her arm.

That’s when she turned one last corner and saw the grass through the doors. Thirteen crashed out of the building, feeling the cool ground on her feet. She laughed to herself, jumping up and down, and feeling the grass with her toes. It was a cool day, but the sun was shining through a cloud and Thirteen was outside for the first time. Green trees were towering over her, and the road led her away from the building and towards her family.


	6. Following Rumors

Thirteen followed the road, watching the occasional car roll by her. She was free, and she wasn't going back. The cold was welcome, and Thirteen couldn’t stop running her fingers through her growing hair, happily feeling the wind on her face.

Thirteen walked briskly, determined to put as much distance between her and Dr. Taylor as she could. When the sun started to set, Thirteen sat down in the grass. She felt the dirt on her palms as she stared up at the pink skies ahead of her. Her stomach rumbled, and she got to her feet again, insistent on finding food or someone to help her.

In the darkness, Thirteen started to feel fear for the first time since she’d escaped. She walked along the edge of the highway, hungry and directionless. The lights that ran along the side of the road were dim, and Thirteen found herself staring into their pale yellow light to distract herself from the line of unwelcoming cars, zooming past her and sending waves of cold wind into her numb face.

Some time after the sun had set, Thirteen reached the city. The skyline lit up the dark blue sky with its grid of yellow lights, beckoning Thirteen to come closer. Her motivation came back to Thirteen, and she let her weak legs carry her forward. The road signs she passed lead her closer to the city, each bearing the same word, Indianapolis. Once in the heart of the city, Thirteen felt smaller than she ever had. The buildings reached up into the sky, looming over her and disappearing into the sky. Booming music from the clubs she passed echoed through the streets as Thirteen’s bare feet moved her quickly through the city, avoiding the men who called out after her and searching for some safe place to rest.

Thirteen slept that night in an alley. One streetlight watched over her, letting its cool blue light reflect on the wet cement in front of her. Thirteen tucked her legs and arms into her dress, now covered with dirt and grass. She was freezing cold. Although the chilling winds made goosebumps appear on her skin, she didn’t hate it. Used to the unrelenting heat that Dr. Taylor kept her in, the cold was more than welcome. She rested her head against the cold ground, shivering and begging sleep to take her away from the darkness. 

Thirteen’s sleep wasn’t dreamless, but her usual nightmares were replaced with brand-new one. Visions of Dr. Taylor finding her in the city and burning her again flashed through her mind, unrelenting and unforgiving. 

In the morning, Thirteen watched the sun turn the black sky blue. Crowds of people in suits swarmed down the sidewalk as the day began, some stopping to drop change into a plastic cup next to Thirteen. Thirteen hungrily accepted the money and followed some sweet, sugary smells to a nearby bakery. Handing over her few dollars in change, Thirteen took a warm muffin from the lady at the bakery. It was soft and perfect, filled with little blueberries that seemed to explode with flavor in Thirteen’s mouth.

“Here, you can have another,” the lady told her, happily presenting her with another muffin, this time dark brown and covered in chocolate chips. Thirteen thanked the lady, who sadly watched her scarf down the muffin.

“Honey, do you need me to call someone? Your parents?” The woman spoke softly, and Thirteen was beyond grateful for one of the adults to finally offer help.

“My mother’s name is Eleven,” Thirteen told the woman. The idea of meeting her mother warmed her up more than the muffins had, and Thirteen’s smile only faded when she saw the stunned look on the baker’s face. Thirteen felt the judgment and pity on the woman’s face like an avalanche of disappointment falling onto her heart. Thirteen knew she should have known that nobody in the real world would understand her, and nobody here could help.

Thirteen wandered down the street, asking strangers for help and only receiving a couple nickels dropped into the plastic cup that Thirteen toted along. She tried to go into some shops, looking for a jacket or a blanket, but every store told her that she didn’t have enough money and she needed shoes to shop there. One storeowner felt sympathy for the pathetic young girl, and pointed her in the direction of a thrift store. Thirteen picked out the first clothes she could. She chose a cream-colored thermal shirt and a large sweater to go over it, soft and much too big for her. She grabbed a pair of jeans, the first ones she could find that looked to be her size, with gaping holes ripped in them. Thirteen chose a worn pair of sneakers, which were much too small for her, but were all the thrift store had. After Thirteen bought them, she shed her blue dress and put on her new clothes. She stared at herself in the changing room mirror, smiling at her new appearance. If only Dr. Taylor could see her now! Aside from the dirt smudged on her face, Thirteen almost blended in with the normal people in the city.

On her way out of the store, Thirteen tossed her dress into the garbage happily, elated to be rid of it once and for all. She made her way down the street again, feeling a great deal warmer. The strangers she passed barely noticed her, but that proved to be a loss when Thirteen stopped getting change from them. She discarded her plastic cup on the sidewalk and continued on.

The day was half-over by the time she got some help. Two teenagers, who had been smoking on a street corner had stopped Thirteen, complimenting her jeans.

“Hey kid, nice outfit,” one boy said, gesturing towards his own ripped jeans. 

“Thanks,” Thirteen replied dully, ready to keep walking.

“Woah, woah. Are you alright?” Another kid stepped in front of her, noticing the dirt on the girl’s face and the drying tears under her eyes.

“No,” Thirteen breathed, letting fresh tears fall onto the purple bags that lurked under her eyes. 

“Where are you headed?” the first boy asked, putting out his cigarette and speaking kindly to Thirteen, more kindly than any adult that had passed her that day.

“I’m looking for someone. Her name is Eleven, and no one’s helping me,” Thirteen sobbed.

“Here I’ll Google her. Can you tell me more about her?” The boys took out their cellphones.

“She lived in a lab. Her name was Eleven. She had a shaved head. She lived with a police officer.,” Thirteen listed off anything she could remember about her mother, careful not to reveal anything about her powers.

“The only thing I’ve got is some conspiracy theory about some place called Hawkins, Indiana,” the first boy told her.

“Me too,” the other said. “Something about government testing, shit. ‘Hawkins Lab, closed in 1985, was the site of many alleged government tests, issued by Dr. Martin Brenner. Dangerous substances leaking from the lab were confirmed to have killed Barbara Holland, a local teenager. At that time, local rumors of a girl with a shaved head and telekinetic powers originating in the lab were rampant in Hawkins. These rumors remain unconfirmed, and should be treated as an old wive’s tale.’”

“I think that’s it,” Thirteen said, wiping away her tears. The boy continued reading.

“‘The dangers of the lab were exposed by a private investigator, Murray Bauman. Police chief Jim Hopper has declined to comment on his failure to solve Barbara Holland’s case.’ Is that your police officer?”

“Yes, Jim Hopper,” Thirteen said.

“Do you need help getting to Hawkins? We can give you money for the bus if you want,” the first boy offered Thirteen some cash. Thirteen thanked the boys for their help, and they told her which bus to take.

Thirteen watched the sun set over the Indiana fields through the bus window. The trees that rolled past the bus were beautiful shades of green and yellow, with their leaves shaking happily in the wind. Thirteen watched each road sign pass by, studying the white letters placed evenly over the green background. She held a scrap of paper in her hand, with the word ‘Hawkins’ scrawled messily in Sharpie. The boys had given her the paper so that she would know when to get off the bus, and Thirteen cheerfully memorized the letters, excitement overtaking her fear.

For the first time in her life, Thirteen was heading home. She was going to meet her family. Each mile that stood between her and Dr. Taylor filled Thirteen with a new sense of hope. 

When the bus stopped in Hawkins, Indiana, Thirteen was the only one to get off. She climbed down the steps, thanking the driver and gazing out over the town. Hawkins was smaller than she imagined, with a small buildings crowded around the town square and large oak trees sprinkled everywhere there was room. People walked through the streets, each on a different mission, and Thirteen wondered if any one of them was her mother. 

The people in Hawkins were much happier to stop and help Thirteen than the people in Indianapolis had been. However, each time she mentioned the name ‘Eleven’, the people would put on the same puzzled expression. One man asked her to repeat, assuming that he had heard wrong.

“I said Eleven. She lives here, I think. She grew up in Hawkins Lab,” Thirteen tried to explain, but at the mention of the lab, the man scoffed.

“You can’t believe everything you read on the internet, kid,” he told her, marching away indignantly.

After that, Thirteen started asking about a Chief Jim Hopper. One elderly woman walked with Thirteen to a nearby nursing home, not bothering to ask why the girl needed to speak with a retired cop.

Jim Hopper had been in the nursing home for five years, rarely visited and very sick. He had Alzheimer’s, and without his daughter, there was nobody there to take care of him.

“El,” Hopper called out when Thirteen opened his door. “Did you eat your dinner? Remember, dinner before Eggo’s, okay kid?”

“What?” Thirteen asked. She hesitantly walked closer to the man’s bed.

“El,” Hopper insisted.

“You think I’m Eleven?” Thirteen whispered. 

“Have you visited Mike today? I know you miss him, kid. I promise, you’ll see him soon,” Hopper told her. Thirteen backed away from his bed, not understanding what he meant. She left the room, discouraged and confused. After all these years, had she really reached a dead end? Frustration overwhelmed her. Her fists clenched at her side and her brow furrowed, as she tried to hold back the tidal wave of anger that pounded in her chest.

Thirteen wandered through the halls of the nursing home, not knowing where to go next. She stared at the worn sneakers on her feet as she walked, turning corners absentmindedly and nearly colliding with an old woman.

“Oh! Sorry, honey,” the woman said. When Thirteen didn’t speak, she put her hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Are you alright?”

“Do you know who Mike is?” Thirteen asked the woman, who raised her eyebrows.

“I know a Mike Wheeler,” the woman said.

“Who is he?” Thirteen asked, wondering if she had really hit a dead end after all.

“Well, he was friends with my son, Lucas. He was married to this nice girl, El.” Thirteen’s heartbeat picked up, and she looked hopefully at the old woman. _El. Eleven._

“Where are they now?” Thirteen asked, hardly able to stand still. Maybe she wasn’t just about to find her mother, she was about to find her father too!

“I don’t know. El Wheeler went missing years ago, and Mike left town, heartbroken, right after.” The woman spoke sadly, noticing the shattered look on Thirteen’s face. _Dead end._

“Who’s your son?” Thirteen asked, trying to keep the conversation going and desperate not to fall apart in front of the kind woman.

“Lucas Sinclair. He lives in town, I can give you his address if you like.” 

Mrs. Sinclair knew who the girl was. Her face was identical to her father’s after all, and although she’d barely spoken to El before she disappeared, she knew that El had been pregnant when she went missing. Mrs. Sinclair wrote her son’s address on a piece of paper and sent the girl on her way. If anyone would know what to do, it would be her son, the former cop and Mike’s best friend.


	7. Six Phone Calls

After she finished her story, Lucas left Thirteen’s room, and went back into the kitchen. He washed the dishes from the pancake breakfast, and picked his phone off the table. He walked to his back porch, and searched ‘Madmax’ in his phone. He called Max first, and he wasn’t sure why.

Max Mayfield-Connors was living in California again, with her wife and two sons. She never expected to be a soccer mom, but there she was in her SUV, dropping her 15-year-old off at his high school for soccer practice. Next stop was the middle school, for her 12-year-old’s soccer match. Her wife was Laura Connors, who had been a business major at Max’s college. They moved to California together and decided to adopt their sons. Everything just fell into place for Max. 

Max regretted not being with Mike or El more before they went missing. Max had been the first to leave Hawkins, and she had never even got to see El with her baby bump. Max thought about her friends often, maybe too often, but she never expected to get a call like the one she got on April 14th, 2018.

Max was at the soccer match, cheering her youngest son on, when she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. She was surprised to see the name ‘Lucas Sinclair’ on her phone. 

“Hey, Stalker!” Max greeted Lucas.

“Hey, Madmax,” Lucas replied, though not as cheerfully.

“What’s going on?” asked Max. Lucas had only said those two words, but Max was already hoping for news on Mike or El, just like every time they talked.

“Where are you? I hear cheering,” Lucas stalled.

“Kid’s soccer game. What’s up?”

“I have some big news, can you go somewhere more private?”

_This is it!_ This was what Max had been waiting for. _Mike or El- maybe both- were back in Hawkins!_ Max walked to the parking lot, and got in her car.

“Okay, I’m alone.”

“Are you sure?”

“ _Yes_. Now come on, what’s this big news?” Max asked impatiently.

“So, a girl came to my door last night…”

“And?”

“Max, it was their daughter. Mike and El’s.”

Max nearly dropped her phone. She’d waited eighteen years for some news of Mike or El, and somehow their kid showing up without El never occurred to Max.

“What? Where’s El? Where has she been all this time? What-”

“I don’t know. But she has powers, Max. She can set things on fire with her _mind_ , she showed me. And she says that she’s been trapped in the basement of some building, by a Dr. Taylor, who had all these machines and a video of El from the lab. And her name is Thirteen. She has a tattoo. I think Dr. Taylor is a follower of Brenner, and she tortured her. She has a giant burn on her arm and she’s so scared.” The story spilled out of Lucas, and he realized that he was more desperate for help than he thought.

Max couldn’t say anything. She was in shock. 

“Max? Say something,” Lucas pleaded.

“Who have you told? Nancy?”

“No, you were the first person I called.”

“What, are you crazy? Why? Call Nancy. I’ll get a plane ticket.”

“What about your family?”

“Laura can take care of the boys. I have to see this girl with my own two eyes.”

 

———

 

Nancy Wheeler was a investigative journalist, living in New York. Her teenage dreams of avoiding the “perfect” house, husband, and kids had came true. She was successful, and very happy. Nancy almost never thought about her monster-hunting history. She missed her brother and her sister-in-law, but the more supernatural aspects of their story seemed like a distant dream to Nancy. 

Nancy was in her office, just back from her lunch break. She had a cup of tea in her right hand, and some notes for an upcoming article in her left. Her personal phone was usually on silent in her bag at this time of day, but today, Nancy was expecting a call from her sister, Holly. When her phone rang, Nancy put her tea down, pushed her glasses up on her nose, and picked up the phone without glancing at the name.

“Hey,” said Nancy, casually.

“Um, hi, Nancy.” Lucas said.

“Who is this?” asked Nancy, surprised to hear a voice other than her sister’s.

“Lucas Sinclair.”

“Oh, hey Lucas. Everything okay?”

“Well… I actually have some news.”

“Can this wait? I’m expecting a call from Holly.” Nancy spoke while simultaneously writing a note down on a post-it.

“No, it can’t. It’s about Mike and El.” Lucas only said their names to get Nancy’s attention. It worked. Nancy stopped writing and fell silent. “Nancy?” Lucas asked.

“What happened?” Nancy asked, putting her notes down.

“I met their daughter. She came to my house, and she has powers like El.”

All of the supernatural parts of their story came rushing back to Nancy. It wasn’t a dream anymore, it was real again. Nancy felt like she did when she was first stuck in the Upside Down and she met the Demogorgon. She felt like it had been too real, and she couldn’t get it out of her head. Lucas kept talking.

“She has 013 tattooed on her arm, and she can set things on fire with her mind. She says that she was living in a basement, and a ‘Dr. Taylor’ taught her to use her powers like El. I think this doctor is a follower of Brenner, and she’s been torturing Thirteen for half her life, trying to get her to use her powers. She has a giant burn mark on her arm, it’s horrible. But she doesn’t know where El is, and I told her that you might know where Mike went.” 

“Lucas… I don’t know where Mike went,” Nancy said sadly. 

“You don’t? I always thought you knew but you didn’t tell anyone else because he wanted to be alone or something,” Lucas said, disappointed. How could he tell Thirteen that her dad was missing too?

“He never told me, and I never tried to track him down. Look, I’ll take a vacation and leave work now, and I’ll be back in Hawkins by tonight. Who else knows about her?”

“Just you and Max and I. I’m about to call the others.”

“Call Will next,” Nancy advised. “He needs to know. He was closer to the supernatural stuff than the rest of us combined.”

 

———

 

Will Byers was an artist. He was well known for his painting series _Upside Down_ , which was obviously based on his childhood trauma, though the art community thought it was merely a complex metaphor. Will now lived in Chicago, teaching art classes at a small art college. 

Will was heartbroken when El went missing. Will and El were linked. They were step-siblings, and they had grown close. And when Mike left town after El, Will was very affected by their disappearance. Losing two best friends was too much for Will, and he had grown very somber and isolated in the months after their disappearance. In January, 2001, Will had moved to Chicago, likely for the same reasons Mike left for.

On April 14, 2018, Will was in his apartment, enjoying his day off teaching by reworking an old painting. He wiped his messy hands on a rag when he heard his phone vibrate. 

“Lucas, how are you?” Will was excited to hear his friend’s voice.

“Hey Will,” Lucas replied, not knowing how to answer the question.

“What’s up?” said Will, more casually than he felt.

“I actually have some big news. You alone?” Lucas was starting to feel strangely roboticabout how he delivered this life-changing news.

“Yeah, what is it?” said Will, growing more anxious by the second.

“Mike and El’s daughter is here,” Lucas said slowly.

“What did you say?”

“Their daughter. She came to my house.” Will was silent for a minute, but what he said next surprised Lucas.

“She has powers, doesn’t she?” 

“How did you know?” Lucas asked.

“I always thought their kid would have some abilities. What can she do?”

“Fire. She can set things on fire with her mind.” Lucas said, stunned at Will’s reaction.

“Does she know where El is?”

“No, no. Her name is Thirteen. She has the tattoo, just like El’s. And the short hair, though her buzzcut is growing out already. She says she grew up in a basement somewhere, with a woman named Dr. Taylor teaching her how to use her powers, and torturing her. She escaped and found me, and I’m trying to figure out how to find Mike.”

“Holy shit…” Will started. He nervously fiddled with the bracelets he always wore on his left wrist.

“I know.”

“Wait, I have an idea. When I was missing, El found me using her powers. Do you think Thirteen could find Mike- and El- the same way?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Lucas was shocked at Will’s composed and smart responses. It was like he had known this would happen.

“I’ll cancel my classes for this week, and I’ll drive down. I’ll see you later today. Call me if anything else happens.”

 

———

 

Dustin Henderson was a science teacher in North Carolina. He lived in a small town in the mountains with his wife and their adopted daughter. When he got Lucas’s call, he dropped everything and got in his car to leave for Hawkins. Dustin, like Nancy, tried not to think about the bad parts of his childhood, and never thought about Mike and Eleven at all, if he could help it. But as soon as Dustin heard the news, he snapped back into his childhood personality. He drove quickly, trying to figure out a plan to find Dr. Taylor, and imagining what Thirteen would be like. Memories of his friends flicked through his mind, and Dustin was determined to get back to Hawkins quickly.

 

———

 

Jonathan Byers had grown fond of El, as his step-sister. He’d never had a sister, but this girl had been so charming and kind, that she won Jonathan over. When El went missing, Jonathan never told anyone how heartbroken he was. He hid all the pictures of her that he’d taken, and only kept one Hopper-Byers family portrait up in his tiny New York apartment. Jonathan wasn’t as successful as Nancy or Will, though he remained close with both of them. He would occasionally do photography jobs for Nancy’s articles, and once did an art show with Will. 

Jonathan had a girlfriend, and happened to have a date with her planned on the day that Lucas called. Jonathan told his girlfriend that he had to cancel their date to go deal with family business, which started an argument between them. Jonathan ended up leaving the apartment in a hurry and jumped on the same plane as Nancy, though neither of them knew it.

 

———

 

Steve Harrington, like Lucas, was a police officer. He was living in Indianapolis and had a wife and twins, a son and daughter. Steve didn’t know Mike or El as well as the others, but he still thought about them both often. Steve jumped into action when he heard the news. He kissed his wife and kids goodbye, and drove down to Hawkins, quizzing Lucas to get every bit of information out of him on the way. 


	8. In The Bath

Steve arrived in town first. He pulled up in front of Lucas’s house and took a breath of that familiar Hawkins air. Lucas had been waiting for him, and walked to his front lawn to greet him. 

“Sinclair! Can’t believe you still live in this shithole,” Steve started, trying to act like this was a casual meeting. But Lucas didn’t have time for smalltalk. He gestured to Steve’s handcuffs.

“You have to put those away. Remember, I told you she’s scared of them,” Lucas said.

“Got it,” Steve said, tossing his cuffs into the car. The two walked to the front door together, and Lucas let Steve inside. Thirteen was sitting in her spot on the couch, with her blanket. She had just had a shower, and was wearing one of Lucas’s old t-shirts and her torn jeans. Steve walked slowly up to Thirteen.

“Uh, hey, I’m Steve,” he said.

“Hi, Steve,” Thirteen answered. “I’m Thirteen.”

“You look so much like your parents,” Steve said. Thirteen looked a bit sad upon hearing this, and Steve awkwardly took a seat on the couch next to Lucas. 

“Have you talked to her about finding Mike? Like El found Will?” Steve muttered to Lucas.

“Not yet,” Lucas answered. “I’ve mostly been explaining to her what a TV is and what a phone is.” Thirteen was watching _Jeopardy_ , fascinated but still skittish.

“Thirteen? I was talking to Will on the phone, and he suggested something,” Lucas started.

“What is it?” she asked.

“When Will was lost in the Upside Down, Eleven found him using her powers, remember?” Thirteen nodded. “Well we think you might be able to find your parents that same way,” Lucas finished.

“I can’t. I don’t know how,” she said slowly. Steve spoke this time.

“We can show you how your mom did it. Can we try it, at least?” he asked. Thirteen nodded again, and turned her attention back to the TV.

Will came into town next, and picked up Nancy and Jonathan at the airport on his way. The three of them knocked on Lucas’s door, and Lucas invited them in. 

Nancy spoke to Thirteen first.

“Hi, Thirteen. I’m Nancy. I’m your aunt.”

“Aunt?” Thirteen wasn’t familiar with the word.

“Yeah, I’m your dad’s sister. You're my niece.” Thirteen smiled her small smile.

“We’re family,” she said happily. It wasn’t the same as having her parents there, but this was what Thirteen had longed for.

"We’re family too,” said Jonathan. “I’m Jonathan, and this is Will. Your mom was our sister,” he smiled at her. She looked a lot like Mike, but Jonathan saw so much of El in her.

Thirteen’s eyes were filled with tears, but she was beaming brightly at her family. She looked at Will. 

“You’re Will?” Will nodded, shyly. “My mom found you?” Thirteen asked.

“Yes, she saved me. More than once, actually. Your parents were good people,” Will choked out.

The group ate dinner together, chatting about old times and getting to know their new family member. After dinner, Lucas brought up the bath.

“Remember in ’83, when we put together the sensory deprivation tank for El to find Will?” Only Nancy and Jonathan nodded. “I think we should try and do the same thing, and see if Thirteen can find Mike and El,” Lucas told them. “It’s worth a try, at least. Right?”

The group decided to try it and quickly started working. They decided to use Lucas’s bathtub, which was the perfect length for Thirteen to lay down in. Steve and Jonathan went to get the salt, which they calculated that they needed at least 6 50-pound bags. By 8:00, Both Dustin and Max had called to say that they were coming into town tomorrow. At 8:30, Steve and Jonathan returned with the salt, and they started building the bath. 

Lucas went through the box of old police equipment in Thirteen’s closet and grabbed his old police radio. He was about to close the closet, when a small box caught his eye. It was labeled ‘Photos, 1998’. Lucas immediately knew exactly why that box was shoved to the back of the guest room closet, and wasn’t resting neatly in his own closet along with the rest of his photos. When Lucas had moved into his house in 2008, he had gone through all of his photos and collected every single picture of Mike or El he could find. He had stuffed those photos in the 1998 box and buried them in the closet. He took a deep breath to prepare himself and opened the box slowly. He picked up the first photo in the stack. It was one that Jonathan had taken in December of 1996. Lucas was posing next to Mike and El, who each wore reindeer antlers on their heads. Lucas felt a pang in his heart, as he remembered that day. It was the party’s Christmas celebration, and Mike and El had shown up wearing the reindeer antlers. They brought a third pair of antlers, and they had kept trying to put them on Lucas’s head all night. In the photo, Mike was trying to put the antlers on Lucas, who was resisting. On Mike’s left, El was laughing and watching them fight. Lucas put the photo in his pocket and gently placed the box back in the closet.

Next, Thirteen and Nancy took Lucas’s place in the guest room, to work on finding a blindfold. The two of them dug through the old boxes of Lucas’s clothes.

“Nancy?” Thirteen squeaked.

“Yeah?”

“I’m nervous,” she said quietly

“It’s going to be okay,” Nancy said, voice cracking. She was thinking about the last time she had made a sensory deprivation tank. That's when Eleven had yelled that Barb was ‘gone’. Nancy was pushing away the idea of Thirteen yelling that Mike was ‘gone’ too. “I’ll be right there next to you, if it gets too scary. And if you try and you can’t do it, that’s okay too, everyone will understand.”

Thirteen held up a black piece of cloth to her eyes.

“This one works,” she said.

“Are you ready?” Nancy asked her. Thirteen took the cloth off her eyes and stood up. Her usual look of steely courage was back on her face.

“I’m ready.”

Thirteen walked into the crowded bathroom and stepped into the water. She sat down and looked at Lucas, who was tuning his old police radio to an empty channel. Lucas looked over at her.

“I have something for you,” he said. He pulled the photo of her parents out of his pocket and handed it to her. She held in both hands, examining the picture with disbelief. She did look like her father. He had the same freckled cheeks as Thirteen. Her eyes went to her mother’s face. It was unmistakably the girl from the video; the girl who could easily crush cans with her mind. 

But she looked different here. She was older, but clearly happier, and healthier too. She had long, dark brown hair and a huge smile on her face. Thirteen looked up at Lucas again.

“You can do this, Thirteen.”

Thirteen carefully placed the photo on the edge of the tub, and tied the black cloth around her eyes. She let herself sink into the bathtub. At first, she was very aware that she was in water, with five people staring at her, but after a few minutes she started to feel relaxed and alone. It did feel like she was floating, and like she was in a new place altogether. She wasn’t hot or cold, she just was. She felt the edge of the tub on her feet. Thirteen opened her eyes. 

She was completely surrounded by darkness. But she wasn’t floating, she was standing, and she looked down and saw her arms, with her tattoo and burn. She was herself, but she was alone, standing in shallow water. She suddenly remembered why she was doing this.

_Mike._

She heard a noise behind her. A man was sitting at a desk with his back to Thirteen. 

“Dad?” she said. The man didn’t move.

Thirteen walked slowly towards the man. He was writing something, and didn’t notice her walking closer to him. When she looked at him, she saw her own face, though more angled and aged. It was her nose, her forehead, her cheeks, and her freckles. It was unmistakably the man from the photo, though she now saw him more vividly than the photo allowed. He had long black hair that he pushed away from his face. Thirteen studied what he was writing, trying to memorize the symbols, even though she knew that there was no chance of deciphering what they meant, as Dr. Taylor had never taught her to read. Thirteen noticed a radio on Mike’s desk making a small crackling noise. It echoed Lucas’s radio, sitting on the edge of the bathtub. 

“Dad,” she tried again. Mike looked up, but not at her. He just glanced up at the radio. Thirteen stretched her hand out to touch her dad, her last effort to get his attention. Just before her hand reached his shoulder, Thirteen watched her dad turn into smoke. Mike and his desk disappeared before her eyes,replaced by the empty darkness of the void. Thirteen stepped back in fear. She started panicking, now trapped in this empty place without her dad.

“Dad!” she screamed into the black air. She sobbed and fell to her knees, still yelling for her father to come back. But she was alone. Until a hand grabbed her.


	9. The Forgotten Monster

“Thirteen!” Lucas cried. He grabbed her arm, and pulled her out of the boiling water. 

Thirteen, still blindfolded, stumbled out of the water, shaking. Lucas helped her onto the floor of the bathroom, and he slipped her blindfold off. Thirteen found herself crying limply in Lucas’s arms. She had ash on her hands and blood under her nose, and to her right was the bathtub. The once still water was boiling, and Thirteen was responsible.

To her left, the others had backed up against the sink, and Jonathan had left the bathroom altogether. Nancy was crying, and Steve had a hand on her shoulder. Will was shaking along with Thirteen, and nervously fiddled with the bracelets on his left arm. Thirteen had been screaming, “Dad,” over and over again.

Lucas picked Thirteen up and carried her to her spot on the couch, away from the hot water in the bathroom. He draped her blanket over her wet body and sat next to her. 

“Can you tell us what you saw?” Steve asked Thirteen.

“Give her a minute,” Lucas snapped at him.

Thirteen waited until she stopped shaking, and said simply, “I saw him.”

“Mike?” asked Lucas.

“Yes. He was writing something. He looked like me.”

“What did it say? What was he writing?” Nancy asked, eager to find her brother.

“I don’t know,” Thirteen explained, “I can’t read.”

The group seemed to let out a collective sigh. They were no closer to finding Mike. But Thirteen reached her hand up and drew a symbol on Lucas’s hand.

“That’s a ‘K’,” Lucas said. Thirteen traced another symbol into his hand. “And that’s a ‘Y’.”

“Kentucky,” Nancy said. Thoughts were racing through her mind like thoroughbreds, the way they always did when she was solving a puzzle. She moved to Lucas’s coffee table and picked up a letter off the stack of magazines and bills. “Did what Mike was writing on look like this?” Thirteen nodded, her dark eyes looking up at Nancy. Nancy took a pen out of her pocket and flipped the letter over. She wrote something and showed it to Thirteen. “Does this look like what he wrote?”

“Yes,” Thirteen said. Nancy straightened up, satisfied.

“What does it say?” asked Jonathan. Lucas read aloud over Thirteen’s shoulder.

_Louisville, KY_

“Does that mean Mike’s living in Louisville?” Will asked.

“I think so,” Nancy explained, “He and El stayed there for a weekend in like ’96, remember? I think it was for a mini-vacation to watch the horses race or something. Maybe everything here in Hawkins reminded him of her when she went missing, but he didn’t want to go to a completely new place with no memories of her. So he went somewhere with only a few nice memories.”

“That does sound like Mike,” Lucas offered.

“So what’s next? Do we take Thirteen to see him?” Will asked.

“I think she should try to find El in the bath next, if she can,” Steve said.

“Let’s worry about it tomorrow, okay? Thirteen is exhausted and I think we all need some rest. Max and Dustin get here tomorrow morning, so let’s figure it out then,” Lucas said. He helped Thirteen into her room. When he came back out, Nancy and Steve had claimed the couches, and Will and Jonathan were setting up makeshift sleeping bags on the living room floor, using any spare pillows and blankets they could find.

Lucas wandered into his room and let himself fall blindly onto his bed.

“Ow!”

He had smacked his head on the pair of handcuffs he had thrown there this morning. Lucas swept the handcuffs into his nightstand drawer and almost immediately slipped into sleep, without even turning his light off.

 

———

 

Lucas woke up the next morning to the wonderful smells of Bacon and Eggs. His house rarely smelled this good, and for a second he thought he was still dreaming. But he managed to stand up and wander down the hall, towards the kitchen. He was greeted by the image of Jonathan cooking breakfast and Nancy gathering all the clean plates and silverware she could find, as nearly everything was dirty from last night’s dinner. The rest of the group was sitting down at the kitchen table. Will and Thirteen were laughing at Steve, happily eating his eggs out of a particularly tacky-looking fruit bowl. It was striped, blue and red, and looked especially cartoonish since it only held Steve’s two eggs. Steve scraped the inside of the bowl while trying to pick up a bite of egg.

“Hey, take it easy, my sister bought me that bowl,” Lucas said, slumping into his seat.

“Your sister must hate you,” Steve replied, before stuffing some egg into his mouth. “Seriously, Sinclair, this has got to be the ugliest bowl I’ve ever seen,” Steve continued after swallowing his bite.

“It’s not that bad,” Lucas defended his bowl. “I think the only thing making it look stupid is that you’re eating out of it,” Lucas said with a smile. Thirteen laughed again, and Lucas grinned at her.

“Let’s see you do better,” Nancy said, setting down a muffin tin in front of Lucas. There were two eggs and a few strips of bacon in the tray, and each egg and bacon strip was set inside its own ‘muffin’.

“This is so unfair, it’s my house!” Lucas laughed.

“Too bad,” said Nancy, “Thirteen and Will were the first up, so they got the last two plates.” Thirteen and Will held up their plates to gloat, but Lucas happily noted that Thirteen had eaten all of her breakfast.

“Oh, also, we’re out of silverware,” Jonathan said, laughing. He held up a spatula.

“Hell no! Thirteen, give me your fork!” 

Thirteen laughed, but passed her fork across the table. Jonathan and Nancy joined the others at the table. Jonathan was holding his breakfast on a pie plate and Nancy was holding hers inside a Tupperware container. They took turns using Will’s fork, and the group had a happy morning, laughing over their odd dishes.

At noon, Dustin got to the house. He was filled in on everything that had happened the night before, and right when they finished catching him up, Max got to the house and they had to go through the whole story all over again. The group agreed to try the void again, to find El. But they had used all the salt the night before, and the store was sold out. Dustin brought up how El didn’t need the bath, just a radio. Lucas ran to get his radio, and Thirteen’s blindfold. Thirteen was scared, but she told the others that she needed to find her mother. She was determined.

Before she knew it, Thirteen was in the dark void again. She waited to feel the ground on her feet again before she opened her eyes, but it took even longer this time, since she didn’t have the same sensation as the sensory deprivation tank provided. Thirteen was distracted by how she had boiled the water the night before, and she was afraid she would unconsciously use her powers again. After that thought entered her mind, it took more time for her to feel calm and alone again. But eventually, she felt the ground on her feet and opened her eyes. She was surrounded by darkness again, just like last night. This time, Thirteen was determined to find her mother.

_Eleven._

She turned around, expecting to see a figure behind her, just like her father, but there was nobody. Thirteen walked quickly through the water, trying to find something, anything, that told her that she wasn’t alone in this void. But she was.

Thirteen dropped to her knees. She just sat there. She didn’t scream, cry, or call out her mother’s name. She just sat still and let a dull anger and pain rush freely behind her closed eyes. She heard a voice, Nancy’s. 

_We’re right here, Thirteen, it’s okay._

“Nancy?” Thirteen tried to find her face in the darkness. But she was still alone. Thirteen held her eyes open against the darkness, not wanting to blink and feel that anger. She wiped the sweat off of her face and stood up.

She stared into the darkness. But, somehow it didn’t seem that dark to Thirteen anymore. It seemed to be turning red. Wait, it _was_ turning red. A blood red color surrounded Thirteen, who spun in circles, trying to understand what was happening. She heard a noise coming from above her, and looked up slowly.

 

———

 

Will was standing in the corner of the living room, behind Lucas and Dustin. He was watching the 17-year-old girl in front of him, and suddenly felt a chill rush through his spine. He looked at the police radio in alarm, frozen. Last night, Lucas had set up the radio, because when El had heard a noise from the void, it projected the noise through the radio. So far, there had been no voices loud enough to come through the radio. But there was a sudden crackle, along with a noise Will had only heard a few times before. 

It was a rushing sound, coming from all around him, spinning. It was a never-forgotten memory from the world that Will couldn’t escape from, no matter what, no matter how many times he was saved. It was a noise of a billion grey particles swirling around, reaching for it’s next target. It was the sound of the Mind Flayer.

Will gasped, and he felt like he was back in 1984, in his old house. He heard his own voice, though much younger, echoing in his head.

_It came for me, and I tried- I tried to make it go away. But it got me, Mom. I felt it everywhere. Everywhere. I-I still feel it… I just want this to be over._

“Get her out,” Will said quietly, interrupting his own memory. Max looked at Will.

“What?” she said.

“Get her out, get her out!” Will started yelling. Nobody else in the room could recognize that noise but Will.

“That noise- it’s- it’s the Mind Flayer!” he shouted, between shaky breaths. Only Will knew that they had to get Thirteen out, before she became its next victim.

 

———

 

Thirteen saw the Mind Flayer. It had huge tornadoes for arms, no face, and was indescribably huge. It spun all around Thirteen, moving closer, closer. It was stretching towards her, but Thirteen didn’t run. It wouldn’t have done any good, as the monster seemed to have her surrounded, with a tornado arm in every direction. But Thirteen wasn’t even thinking about running. 

She was frozen, staring up at the monster. She wasn't shaking or crying, just staring. Thirteen didn’t speak; she couldn’t think of any words to say. She just stood there, facing the monster. Wind whipped around her, and she only felt cold.

Will Byers never liked the cold. He had hated it even before he was trapped in the Upside Down in 1983. As a kid, he kept a collection of Jonathan’s old jackets and sweaters to warm him up if he felt even a little chilly. And after his week in the Upside Down, Will felt that he’d had enough cold for a lifetime. Summer became his favorite month, and he got into the habit of layering his shirts, jackets, and coats to keep him extra warm in the winter. But Will moved to Chicago, partially to work on his paintings about the Upside Down and relive the coldest days of his life, and he never left. Will had lived his last eighteen years in the Windy City, as surrounded by the cold as he had been in the Upside Down.

But Thirteen liked the cold. She was used to living in constant, sweltering, unbearable heat, and when she escaped, she found the cold wind of the outside world to be a breath of fresh air, literally. From that point on, heat was an unwanted reminder of her power and the abuse she had suffered. So when she met the Mind Flayer, with the glowing blood-red void framing and illuminating its spinning body, she was captivated by the overwhelming cold it greeted her with. 

When it reached out to her, Thirteen didn’t move. She stood her ground, and let the increasing intensity of the cold winds blow her hair away from her face. She welcomed the cooling winds on her burn mark. The anger that had fueled her for years was gone, lost in the sea of cold winds. The bliss of being away from the rage and the heat was numbing. The Mind Flayer’s cycling arm was getting closer to her, stretching out a whirling finger, pointing at her. It was about to reach her. Another wave of goosebumps moved throughout Thirteen’s body, and she closed her eyes. She felt the powerful winds of the tornado mere inches from her face. She waited for the tornado to reach her. It would be any second now.


	10. Leaving Hawkins, Come Again Soon

Thirteen opened her eyes and looked around her. She was back in her spot on the couch. Lucas and Will had pulled her out, and they were asking her what happened. But Thirteen didn’t answer, she just sat there, still numb. She noticed that she wasn’t cold anymore.

“What happened?” she asked Lucas.

“Will said he heard a monster through the radio. The monster that possessed him when he was a kid,” Lucas explained. Thirteen felt her heart drop. So, that was the monster that got Will. How could she be so stupid? She had almost let it get her too, and why? All because she liked the cold?

“I saw it.” She looked at Will, “It was cold, and big, and it was like a tornado.”

Will looked sick. “Yes,” he started, fidgeting with his bracelets. “That’s the Mind Flayer.”

“How can the Mind Flayer be back?” Steve asked. “We haven’t seen it in 35 years.”

“When El closed the gate, she didn’t kill the monster. She just locked it inside the Upside Down,” Dustin explained. “It’s still there, but Thirteen just saw it through the void, right?” Thirteen nodded.

“Maybe it was attracted to Thirteen because of her powers. Like a magnet. Like the demogorgon and El,” Nancy thought aloud, while cleaning her glasses on her shirt.

“Then why was the Mind Flayer attracted to Will in ’84? You said it used to follow you and reach out to you, right Will?” Dustin said.

Will nodded, fiddling with his bracelets more furiously than before. “I don’t know why it wanted me,” he said quietly. “All I really remember was the noise, and the feeling of it all around me.”

“What did it feel like?” asked Steve.

“Colder than Ice.”

Thirteen stared weakly at Will. He felt her watching him, but he was still fidgeting with his bracelets, and didn’t look up.

“Thirteen, did you at least see El?” Max asked. Everyone held their breath. They had almost completely forgotten about El in the chaos. But Thirteen shook her head sadly, with tears in her eyes, and the group stood still in the overcrowded living room, all thinking about their lost friend.

Nancy helped Thirteen to her into the guest room, to calm her down. 

“You don’t think the Mind Flayer got her, do you?” Steve asked.

“No,” Will answered truthfully. “When it got me, I wouldn’t wake up, right? She woke up right away, so I think it must have tried, but it didn’t get her.”

“She could be faking though,” Jonathan said skeptically. “I mean, you used to lie about what was going on, Will. What if she’s doing the same?”

“Me, Dustin, and Lucas were there when it got Will,” Max started. “He was shaking, and and when he woke up he was different. Thirteen didn’t act like that, so I think she’s fine,” she finished confidently.

“It could be different though, because Will was in the Upside Down when he was taken, and Thirteen was just in the void,” Dustin offered. Will looked like he was going to be sick. The group sat in silence for a few minutes. The guest room door opened.

Thirteen and Nancy walked into the living room. They both glared at Jonathan. Jonathan knew they had heard him suggest that Thirteen had lied. Thirteen sat back down in her spot on the couch, and turned her glare from Jonathan to Dustin.

“Thirteen?” Dustin asked gently, “Did the Mind Flayer get you?” 

Thirteen looked over at him. She shook her head.

“Can you tell us what happened?” Jonathan asked, still slightly suspicious that she could be lying.

“I was looking for Eleven. B-but she wasn’t there, no matter what I did… And then, the black turned red, and I looked up, and the monster came closer. It reached towards me, and it was so cold, and I was frozen. It was everywhere.”

Will felt his heart explode with anxiety. His young voice echoed in his head again.

_Everywhere._

“But it didn’t get me,” Thirteen finished. Max looked confidently at Jonathan, and mouthed the words ‘told you’. The group sat in silence again. 

Will couldn't stop himself from bitterly wondering who the monsters of the Upside Down would take next. Like Barb, then Bob and all the soldiers of the lab. Will felt responsible for their deaths. And El and Mike’s disappearances. Their blood was on his hands.

Lucas broke the silence. “We have to go find Mike.”

The group nodded. This would be a fairly easy task, as Louisville was about three hours away, and how many Mike Wheelers could there be in Louisville? Max did a quick search on her phone.

“There’s this website where pretty much everyone’s address and phone numbers are up and you can buy people’s information. It’s messed up, but I bet he’s on here,” Max said. But once she’d finished typing in Mike’s full name, she froze, staring at her phone. 

“It says there’s… eleven results for ‘Michael Wheeler’ in Louisville.”

The group was quiet for a few seconds, all trying to brush the number off as merely a coincidence. Dustin quickly broke the tension, suggesting to include Mike’s middle name. One result.

“Okay, I found his address,” Max said. The next few minutes consisted of everyone gathering their belongings and attempting to decide who will ride with whom. It was decided that Lucas will drive Jonathan, Will, and Thirteen, and Steve will drive Nancy, Dustin, and Max. 

Nancy let Thirteen borrow some clothes, so she could change out of her charcoal-covered jeans and Lucas’s ripped t-shirt. Thirteen walked out of her room holding her blindfold and the picture of her parents. She looked up, and found that all eyes were on her.

Thirteen was wearing Nancy’s blue jeans and a red and blue striped shirt under a grey jacket. In the 80s, Mike had been famous for his collection of striped shirts. With that striped shirt on, his daughter was his spitting image.

“Come on, Thirteen,” Lucas said to her, smiling. It had just occurred to him that today he was going to see his best friend for the first time in eighteen years. He wouldn’t have to settle for seeing his daughter in striped shirts, he was going to see Mike Wheeler in person.

The group left Lucas’s house behind and climbed into the two cars. Everyone was feeling optimistic for the first time all day. They were going to find Mike! Steve punched Mike’s address into the GPS and led the way. Lucas made sure Thirteen had her seatbelt buckled, and followed not far behind.

But a third car followed the group. Dr. Taylor was no stranger to Hawkins, Indiana, and had assumed that Thirteen would track down the people who knew her parents. These were the people that had shut down the lab, and had forced Dr. Brenner’s brilliant experiments to end. Dr. Taylor passed a sign and read it aloud to herself in her icy voice. 

“Leaving Hawkins. Come again soon.”

She stepped on the gas.


	11. Mike Wheeler

It had been nearly eighteen years since Mike had left Hawkins. But he thought about his hometown every single day. 

In late June, 2000, Mike was happy as ever. Mike got out of bed before El, as always, and went to make her breakfast in bed. He was halfway through making scrambled eggs when El appeared next to him. 

“What are you doing?” he laughed, “I was going to make you breakfast in bed!”

“You always make me breakfast in bed! I wanted to eat at the table today,” El replied. She slumped into a seat at the table, ready for her food. 

“I wish I could have Eggo’s,” she said.

“The doctor said no, El. You have to eat better for the baby,” Mike reminded her.

“I know, Mike,” she sighed.

“So, when are you having this baby?” Mike asked her.

“My due date was two days ago,” she said. “I’m tired of being pregnant, and I’m so ready to meet this baby.”

“Me too,” Mike said. He scooped the scrambled eggs onto a plate and passed it to El, who quickly started eating. Mike joined her at the table, carrying his own plate of eggs. When they had finished eating, Mike got dressed and left for work.

“I’ll see you tonight, okay? And call me if anything happens with the baby,” Mike said, kissing El on the cheek.

“Okay, love you.”

“Love you too.”

 

———

 

Mike got off work and sped home, excited to greet his wife and hear about any news with the baby. But when he got there, she wasn’t home.

_She could just be at the grocery store. Yeah, that’s probably right. Or maybe she was going to visit her dad, or Will, and just forgot to tell me._

But El didn’t come home. El was never out past 9:30, unless she was with Mike. The couple liked being home together and watching their favorite TV shows, snuggled up on the couch. By 9:45, Mike couldn’t wait anymore. He called Hopper, but he said she never stopped by. He called Will next, but Will said he hadn’t seen her either. It was now 10:00, and Mike’s heart was racing. Mike called everyone he could, but nobody had seen her. 

Mike didn’t sleep that night. Hopper drove over and tried to calm Mike down, but it didn’t help. El was missing. What if something had happened with the baby? Mike fell asleep next to the phone, but it never rang.

 

———

 

In the morning, Mike woke up to Hopper snoring on the couch. El and the baby were still gone. Mike skipped breakfast, and drove around with Hopper, trying to find any sign of El. The hospital hadn’t admitted her, and nobody in town had seen her. It was like she had vanished. Mike couldn't help but think about the last time El went missing. In November, 1983. 

_But she was alive then, and everything turned out okay, so it has to turn out okay this time, right?_

Paranoid thoughts thundered through Mike’s head. She had to be okay. There was no demogorgon here this time to take her to the Upside Down, so she had to be there, somewhere. Could it be that someone had abducted El? Or maybe she was going to take the bus to her mother’s house, and the bus broke down and she was stranded somewhere. Maybe she wasn’t missing at all, and she just spent the day at the park, or decided to crash at a friend’s place. Yes, that was it, El just had a new friend and Mike didn’t have their number. Surely El was about to walk through the front door, carrying groceries or some new baby clothes from Joyce.

Mike came up with a thousand of unlikely scenarios that could explain where El went. One dark thought kept coming back to him, drilling its way into his mind each time it resurfaced. What if she had left him on purpose? What if El had decided that Mike wasn’t a good enough father, and had just left Hawkins?

No, no, no. Mike knew El better than anyone, and he knew that El valued her family more than anything, and she would _never_ leave her home. He simply had to trust that El was out there, fighting hard to get back to him.

Mike never stopped moving on July 1, 2000. Not for a minute. He drove to the police station with Hopper, he drove to Terry and Becky Ives’s house, and he drove down every street in Hawkins five times. El was nowhere to be found.

 

———

 

Mike made it one week before he had to leave town. For the first couple days, he had kept himself moving, but eventually, he broke down. For the next three days, he hardly got out of bed. On the evening of July 6, he packed everything he wanted to take into his car, which ended up being an armful of new clothes, a photo album his friends made, and his old Supercom. Then, he wrote a note. 

 

To my friends and family:

I’m sorry that I have to do this, but I’m leaving Hawkins and I don’t want you to come find me. I’ve been through losing her once before, and it killed me, and I had only known her for a week then. Now, I’ve spent over fifteen years with her, and I don’t know what to do without her. Everything in this town reminds me of her, and I can’t be here anymore. I love you all, but I need to be by myself for a while, and I hope you can understand that. I’m sorry that I didn’t take better care of her. Or the baby.

-Mike

 

The next morning, it was July 7, 2000. Mike woke up early and made himself a pot of coffee. He set his note in the center of the kitchen counter. Hopper had a key and would likely be over later today. He would find the note in Mike’s place. Mike said goodbye to his house, and got in his car to drive around Hawkins one more time. He drove past the schools, his parents’s house, and Mirkwood, where Mike and El had met. Mike stopped his car at Sattler’s Quarry, and walked up the familiar path. He looked down at the water, and remembered the first time that El saved his life. 

“You saved me,” Mike said to himself. _In more ways than one._

Mike Wheeler sat on the edge of the rock, and felt his feet dangle over the water. He watched the sunrise over his hometown, and then left Hawkins behind, once and for all.

 

———

 

On April 15, 2018, Mike woke up on the left side of the bed, like always. He didn’t climb out of bed just yet, and instead sat on his phone, scrolling through all of today’s articles on the app for the local newspaper, the Courier Journal. Finally, Mike climbed out of bed and stumbled into the kitchen. He skipped breakfast, like always, and instead opted for a mug of black coffee. Mike slumped onto the couch and flipped through the TV channels, not finding any appealing. Sunday was his day off of work, but he found it to be the most boring day of the week. Mike made his way to the guest room of his one-story house, which was somehow even smaller than Lucas’s.

Unlike Lucas’s house, the spare bedroom in Mike’s house contained no bed or dusty boxes. It had white walls, which sported many smudges, random nails, and one small hole. The only pieces of furniture in the room were one cheap wooden desk and its matching chair. Mike sat down at the desk, and opened his laptop. The screen was illuminated, and it greeted Mike with a picture of El’s face. 

This computer was there only for Mike to do research on El. Mike had lost her once before, and she came back. This time, she had disappeared without a trace again, but there had been no demogorgon to take her away. So she had to be out there somewhere, _she had to be._ Mike believed in El, and he knew she was alive somewhere. He just needed to find where she was hiding. Mike had been searching for El for eighteen years, and he wasn’t going to stop now.

Mike now turned his attention to the Supercom on the right corner of his desk. It had been giving him the usual crackling noises, but yesterday, he thought he had heard someone speak through it. Mike had been writing a letter,and he had heard some girl call out the word ‘dad’. 

There had been one thing keeping Mike so passionate about his research. One thing that stopped Mike from giving up, out of his frustration with finding nothing. That thing was that Mike occasionally heard Eleven’s voice in the Supercom. She never said a lot, so it was hard for Mike to say whether it was really her. But once, he had heard a voice, _her_ voice, say ‘Mike’. But this had been ten years ago, and he hadn’t heard anything convincing since that day. 

But last night, the girl’s voice was so clear. It wasn’t El’s voice, and it didn’t shock him as much as when he heard El say his name, but it was much more distinct than the noises he usually heard through the speaker. Mike looked up at the wall in front of him. For nearly eighteen years, Mike had kept the Supercom on. Every time he heard a voice, or any noises through the speaker, he wrote it down on a post-it note, along with the time and date. The last note on the wall simply said

 

“Dad.”

April 14, 2018

9:13pm

 

Mike ate his lunch in his “office”, and then his dinner. Mike finally gave up on his research for the day, and walked into the living room. He was watching episodes of some old sitcom on Netflix when he heard a car pull up outside. He looked at his watch. It was two minutes before 9:30. This was the time that Mike and El were usually on their old couch together, watching their old favorite TV shows. 

Mike shook his head to clear the memory from his mind, like an Etch A Sketch, and looked out the window. A car had pulled into his driveway. Mike stood up and leaned forward to get a better view out the window. It was a police car, from… Did that say Indianapolis? Mike squinted out the window, trying to read the writing on the car in the light of the distant streetlight. The driver of the police car opened his door, and to Mike’s surprise, he caught the familiar but aged face of Steve Harrington in the light. Mike kept staring out the window, as the backseat door opened behind Steve, and out stepped Max Mayfield. Next, his older sister, Nancy, walked around the car, looking at Mike’s house. She was followed by a man who Mike didn’t immediately recognize. He blinked, and suddenly saw the face of Dustin Henderson. He almost didn’t recognize Dustin with his new haircut, and without the hat he always wore as a kid. The four people from his past walked toward his front door. What was happening?

Mike’s nostalgia and happiness melted away suddenly. _I told them I didn’t want to be found._ Nancy knocked on the door. Mike considered just leaving them outside, but curiosity got the best of him. How did they know where he was? And why did they wait so long, eighteen long years, to come find him? 

Mike opened the door.

“Mike!” Nancy and Dustin squealed in unison. Nancy stepped forward, attempting to give her brother a hug.

“What are you doing here?” Mike said coldly. Nancy shrunk back.

“We have to tell you-” Steve started, but Max elbowed him in the ribs.

“What?” Mike asked in annoyance. The four visitors stayed silent.

Mike was about to insist that they explain why they were all here on his doorstep, gathered together from across the country, when a second car pulled into his driveway. Jonathan and Will Byers walked around the car together, and hurried up to join the group on Mike’s doorstep.

“Mike,” breathed Will, not believing that he was seeing his best friend in front of him.

“Will,” Mike started, but his eyes were drawn back to the car in his driveway. 

The driver’s door had opened, and Mike saw the face of Lucas Sinclair staring up at him. Lucas quickly opened the backseat door behind him, and he was surprised to see the first unfamiliar face of the night. Although, it wasn’t completely unfamiliar. This new member of the group slowly walked towards Mike, guided by Lucas’s arm around her tiny shoulder. Mike watched in shock, as the small girl walked into the light pouring out of Mike’s doorway. He was looking at his own young face somehow, but what truly caught his attention was the girl’s eyes. They were the eyes he would have recognized anywhere. It was unmistakable. Mike Wheeler was looking his daughter for the first time.


	12. Powerful

Thirteen looked up at her father. This felt so much more real to her than when she had seen him in the bath. This time, he was looking back at her. They stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity. Nobody knew what to do, or how to react to seeing nearly the same face staring at each other, making the same surprised and emotional expression. Both Mike and Thirteen were crying, with their mouths slightly opened in shock, but they were frozen in their places. Finally, Mike stepped outside and wrapped his arms around the small girl. He felt her let out a shaky breath, and reach her small hands up to hug him back.

Mike finally stood up straight, not knowing what to do, or what to say to this girl in front of him. His _daughter_. Mike looked around at the group around him. Nearly everyone had tears in their eyes. 

“Wh-where… How…” Mike stuttered, unable to make it through a full sentence.

“Lets go inside,” Jonathan said, helping a teary Nancy through the open doorway.

“We’ll tell you everything,” Lucas said, replacing his hand on Thirteen’s shoulder. Mike was shaking, and sat down on his couch slowly. He still had no idea how this could be happening. 

“First of all, we don’t know where El is.” Lucas took the lead, as he had the most experience in explaining Thirteen’s arrival.

Mike was staring at the ground, sandwiched between Nancy and Will. Jonathan sat on Will’s other side, and Max was leaning on the wall nearby. Dustin stood, swaying nervously, next to Max. Thirteen was sitting in the armchair, with Lucas balancing on the right arm. Steve stood to Lucas’s right, with his hands in his pocket.

“Her name is Thirteen,” Lucas said. Mike looked up at her. He tried to speak again, but he still couldn’t get any words out.

Lucas launched into Thirteen’s story. He explained Dr. Taylor, the tattoo and burn mark on her arms. He spoke about Thirteen’s brave escape attempts and her journey to Hawkins. He talked about her powers, and the burnt flower in his fireplace. He mentioned calling everyone with the news and uniting the group in his house. He talked about the bath, and how they knew where to find Mike. Finally, Lucas finished with an explanation of Thirteen using the police radio to try and find El, and instead only meeting the Mind Flayer.

Mike continued to stare at the ground. Thirteen watched his face and nervously ran her fingers through her hair. The group remained silent, waiting for Mike’s reaction. But Mike stayed quiet and unmoving. Thirteen sat forward.

“Dad?”

Mike looked up at her, eyes widening.

“I heard you,” he whispered. 

“What?” Dustin asked.

“When you saw me in the bath, you said ‘Dad’, didn’t you?” Mike asked his daughter. Thirteen nodded.

“I heard you. Through the Supercom.”

“Supercom?” Will asked. 

“I always leave it on, incase El says something,” Mike explained. He stood up suddenly, and disappeared down a hallway. The group exchanged glances, and then hastily followed Mike. They found him in his spare bedroom-turned-office. He had picked up his crackling Supercom, and was looking at the post-its on the wall. The group crowded into the room.

“I hear her sometimes,” Mike said, without looking back at them. “She said my name once, and sometimes I can hear her voice but I can’t make out the words.”

The group looked sadly at Mike. He was so obsessed with finding El, and he was grasping at straws. Mike presented his research to the group, but it did little to convince them. Truthfully, each member of the group had thought that there was a chance that El was still out there, but with each passing year they lost a little more faith. Mike grew angry with their inability to acknowledge that El could be alive.

“Look, if _she_ could be here after eighteen years, why can’t El?” Mike argued, gesturing toward Thirteen. Lucas guessed that Mike was having trouble accepting that his daughter was named for a number.

“See, I heard her say my name in 2007. It was her!” Mike pleaded, picking up the post-it note from that day.

“Mike, come on, this isn’t healthy,” Nancy said.

“I know that she’s still out there,” Mike said. “I think she might be stuck in-”

“The Upside Down,” Will finished for him. “Mike, I was only there for a week and it nearly killed me. You think she’s been there for eighteen years?”

“Yes,” Mike said confidently. “It makes sense, doesn’t it? She disappeared without a trace, just like you, Will. I don’t know what took her there, but I’ve been trying to find a way to get her out. The only person I knew who could get El out was El, but now…” He looked at Thirteen hopefully. “You could open the gate,” Mike told her.

Steve said what Lucas was thinking. “No. No way.”

“If you open that gate, you’re opening Pandora's box. All You’re going to do is let out all of the Upside Down’s monsters,” Max said.

“The Mind Flayer, demodogs, demogorgons, and whatever else is living in there now,” Steve counted on his fingers. 

“It’s worth it if I get El out,” Mike said.

“Mike, you don’t even know if she’s in there!” Dustin yelled. “This is insane!”

“Yes I do! I heard her!” Mike shouted back, holding up the post-it note.

“No, Mike! Even if that was her, you have no idea if she was in the Upside Down, or the void, or anywhere! Mike, she’s gone,” Dustin cried back.

“I’m telling you, wherever she is, Thirteen could help find her,” Mike said, calming himself down. Thirteen, who was nervously twisting the dark strand of hair that usually rested on her forehead, looked up when she heard her father mention her name for the first time. Her dark eyes squinted at the scene in front of her, not knowing how to respond to the conflict.

“Mike-” Jonathan tried.

“No, listen, she has fire powers, and everything from the Upside Down hates heat-”

“-Mike, she’s too weak! She can hardly use her powers, she’s not as powerful as El was! It took her over five minutes to set the flower on fire!” Lucas yelled, without thinking. Thirteen winced.

Lucas had hit a nerve. Thirteen was afraid of her powers, and that may have weakened them, but she was not weak. Thirteen felt hot anger at this betrayal bubble up, and she stepped forward. She raised both hands and pointed them toward the small metal garbage can next to Mike’s desk. She yelled, and the crumpled papers resting in the trash can were immediately on fire. 

For the first few seconds, the only sounds in the room were the crackling fire, the Supercom’s feedback, and the gasps of Steve, Nancy and Will. Nobody moved.

Thirteen turned and glared at Lucas. Her nose was bleeding, and beads of sweat were already appearing on her forehead. Thirteen swayed, and fell to the floor. Mike knelt down next to her, and gave Lucas a dirty look. The room was completely still until Jonathan picked up a glass of water from Mike’s desk and poured it over the fire, putting it out. 


	13. Gone To Find El

The rest of the group’s time at Mike’s house was not the fun reunion that everyone was expecting. Mike and Nancy made dinner for the rest of the group, but it was nothing special, just spaghetti and canned sauce. The group ate in silence and then planned out their sleeping arrangements. Most of the group went to a hotel, but Thirteen wanted to stay with her dad, and clearly didn’t want to be around Lucas for a while.

The group said goodbye to Mike and Thirteen, and left the house. Now it was just Mike and Thirteen sitting in an awkward silence, watching an episode of some old sitcom.

“I believe you,” Thirteen said suddenly.

“What?” Mike asked, muting the TV.

“I said I believe you. I think my mom’s alive.”

“You do?” Mike sat forward in his seat and looked at his daughter, smiling slightly.

“Yeah,” Thirteen replied, smiling back. “If I can be here, after eighteen years, she can.” The two exchanged their identical smiles and sat in silence for a second.

“You have her eyes, you know,” Mike told her.

“That’s what everyone’s said,” Thirteen replied. “And we’ve both got powers. And these,” she pulled her jacket sleeve up to reveal her tattoo. Mike’s smile faded as he remembered all the pain his daughter had been through.

“Did you and El ever pick out a name for me?” Thirteen asked her father, praying for a real name. Right now, with heat still in her chest from her earlier outburst, all she wanted was to feel like she wasn’t just that number on her arm.

Mike shook his head sadly. “We were going to decide on a name together once me met you.”

“Oh,” Thirteen couldn’t hide her disappointment. “Maybe when we rescue her, you both can choose a name for me.”

“When we rescue her?” Mike repeated. “You mean-”

“I want to open the gate.”

“What if she’s not there. In the Upside Down, I mean.”

“Then we'll look somewhere else. But at least then we’ll know she’s not there.” Thirteen spoke with so much force, her mind already made up.

Mike was proud of how similar he and his daughter were. Neither of them gave up easily. 

“How do I open the gate?” Thirteen asked.

“El said that when she was twelve, she saw the demogorgon in the void. Brenner made her touch it, and it roared at her. She was scared, so she screamed. Then the gate opened on a wall in the lab.”

“Hawkins Lab,” Thirteen said, nodding. Mike noticed the intensity in her eyes. It was the same intensity that used to flood El’s eyes when she talked about the lab.

“Yeah,” Mike replied. “But without a demogorgon in the void, I don’t know how you would open it.”

“The Mind Flayer.”

“The Mind Flayer?”

“Yes,” Thirteen suppressed a shudder. “When I was looking for Mom in the void, the Mind Flayer tried to get me, but I was pulled out of the void before it could touch me.”

“So do you think if you went to the lab and tried to find El in the void, the Mind Flayer would try and reach you again? And If you let it, it would open the gate again?”

“I think so,” Thirteen nodded again.

“I think so too. It’s just…” Mike started.

“What?”

“I don’t want it to hurt you. I lost your mom, twice. I don’t want to lose you too.” 

Thirteen looked down at the carpet, and quietly said, “I don’t want to lose you either, Dad.” Mike felt a pang in his heart. He had known her for only a few hours, but he loved this girl.

“But I have to save her, if I can,” Thirteen finished, looking back up at Mike.

“Then let’s go,” Mike said, sitting up.

“Really?” Thirteen asked. The determination that always burned behind Thirteen’s eyes was paralleled in Mike’s.

“Yeah, if you feel strong enough. I mean, we could wait until the morning, but I’ve waited to see Eleven for eighteen years, and this is the first time I’ve really had a plan. I’m tired of waiting,” Mike explained, standing up. Thirteen stood up too, not needing to stop and think about it.

“Let’s go.”

Mike hastily wrote a note for the group to find in the morning, when they returned to Mike’s house. It simply said ‘Gone to find El’.

Mike and Thirteen drove off together into the night. 

 

———

 

Dr. Taylor was parked across the street from Mike’s house, waiting for her moment to take Thirteen back. She had watched as the seven remaining group members got into the two cars and drove away, and knew that it was just Mike and Thirteen inside the house. Dr. Taylor’s new plan was to wait for the lights to go off in the house, and take a sleeping Thirteen from the house. But her plan changed when a small, dark green car pulled out of the driveway, and she caught a glimpse of Thirteen’s face in the passenger seat.

Dr. Taylor turned her car on and took off after them. 

_Where are you going now, Thirteen?_

 

_———_

 

Lucas was sharing a hotel room with Dustin, Steve, and Jonathan. Will, Nancy, and Max were in the other room. Lucas was trying to sleep on the room’s couch, but sleep never came. He sat up in the dark hotel room, thinking about Thirteen, and what he’d said. 

_Of course she’s not weak. Why would I say she was? “She can hardly use her powers.” God, what a stupid thing to say. No wonder she was so upset. I have to apologize; I have to let her know I didn’t mean what I said._

Lucas got up from the couch and stumbled through the dark hotel room, careful not to step on Steve, who was sleeping on the floor. He left the hotel room and drove off, back to Mike’s house.

When Lucas arrived at Mike’s house, he realized how dumb his decision to come back was. What, was he just going to knock on the door, and wake up Mike and Thirteen, just to say sorry? Lucas walked up to Mike’s door anyway, ready to start convincing himself to leave before knocking. But something caught Lucas’s eye. A small post-it note was laying upside-down on the doorstep, as if it had fallen from the door. Lucas knelt to pick it up, and read the note in his hand aloud to himself. 

“Gone to find El… Shit!” Lucas ran back to his car and sped off, talking to himself. 

“What are they thinking, leaving to find El this late at night? What are they doing searching for El at all? Where do they think she is?” Lucas loudly asked himself, before nearly crashing into a mailbox with a sudden realization. “Shit! The gate!”

Lucas made it back to the hotel and tore up the stairs, bypassing the elevator. He busted into his hotel room, and flipped the lights on. Two of the three sleeping men woke up, grumbling. Dustin was sleeping on his side, facing away from the light, and wasn’t bothered.

“What the hell… Lucas? Turn the damn light off. I’m going to kill you,” Steve mumbled, sleepily. He sat up on the floor of the hotel room, glaring at Lucas.

“Mike- and Thirteen- they went- to find- El,” Lucas choked, out of breath. He held up the post-it note. 

“W-what?” yawned Jonathan. “Where’d they go?”

“I think- they went to open the gate. Like Mike said,” Lucas said, catching his breath.

“What? Shit. So what do we do?” Steve asked, standing up. Jonathan ran his hands through his hair, preparing himself for their inevitable sleep-deprived mission to stop Thirteen from opening the gate.

“I don’t know, I don’t know. Where are the girls and Will sleeping?” Lucas said, starting to pace back and forth.

“They’re across the hall, room 217,” Jonathan said, getting out of bed. “Steve, wake Dustin up, I’ll go wake up the girls with Lucas.”

Lucas and Jonathan walked to 217 and Jonathan knocked. There was no answer. Lucas then pounded on the door, and yelled for them to wake up. His only response was a _whump_ noise, as someone, likely Max, threw a pillow at the door.

“Come on, guys, get up. It’s serious,” Jonathan called. Finally, Lucas and Jonathan heard the door unlock.

Nancy appeared, not wearing her glasses, and looking more exhausted and annoyed than they’d ever seen her. 

“ _What?_ ” she growled. Lucas handed her the post-it note. Nancy squinted at it, and looked up at Lucas, confused. 

“I found that on Mike’s doorstep. We think that Mike and Thirteen left, to open the gate.” Nancy’s expression changed quickly from confusion to concern. She shut the door without a word, and Lucas heard her yell at her roommates.

“Max! Will! Get up, now. Yes, seriously. Max, if you throw that pillow at me, I swear to- Max!”

Minutes later, Nancy, Max, and Will came outside. Steve and Dustin joined the group in the hallway from their room.

“Please, for the love of God, explain why I’m out here past 1am, Stalker,” Max glared at Lucas.

“Mike and Thirteen went to go find El, and I think they’re going to try and open the gate.”

“Shit,” Max sighed.

“Where would they have gone?” Will asked, fidgeting with his bracelets.

“I don’t know, but we have to stop them,” Lucas replied.

“Obviously,” Steve muttered.

“The old gate was in the lab,” Dustin said, yawning. “Would they have gone back there?”

“That’s probably our best bet,” Nancy offered. “Hawkins is three hours away, but they’d probably want to see El as soon as possible.”

“Do we have any idea when they left?” Jonathan asked. “We last saw them at 10:30, and if they left right after us, they could be nearly there by now.”

“I don’t know, but I think it’s been a while. When I found it, the post-it note had fallen off of the door and the back is hardly sticky anymore,” Lucas said, pressing his index finger against the sticky part of the post-it to demonstrate. 

“I think we’d better go,” Steve said. “I can use the siren on my car to get us there faster.”

The group hastily packed their things and turned in the hotel keys. They left quickly, climbing into the same seats in the cars that they’d been in when they arrived in Louisville. Steve led the way back to Hawkins, using his siren, with Lucas trailing behind him, determined to find Mike and Thirteen. 

But they were going to be too late. By the time the group had left Louisville, Mike and Thirteen were already passing the ‘Welcome to Hawkins’ sign. Thirteen was asleep in the passenger seat, saving her strength for when she faced the Mind Flayer and opened the gate. 

Mike had the radio on, as quiet as possible. Although he could barely hear it, he occasionally caught the tune of a classic rock song. When Mike drove past the Welcome to Hawkins sign, he slowly turned the music up to a normal volume, gently waking his daughter. It just so happened that the song that was playing was Every Breath You Take, by The Police. Immediately, Mike’s mind jumped to memories of the Snowball dance, in ’84, and the first dance at Mike and El’s wedding. Mike smiled to himself, thinking that he’d be seeing his wife soon.

Thirteen sat up in her seat, seeing the familiar town around her. She watched as they drove through the town square, and passed the nursing home where she had met Hopper and Lucas’s mom. 

Mike drove slowly, with tears in his eyes. He hadn’t seen this town in nearly twenty years, but it somehow felt the same as it always had. For a second, Mike forgot why he left Hawkins. But everywhere he looked, he was reminded of El. They’d made so many memories together, that every square inch of Hawkins was like a page in a scrapbook. Each building, road, and patch of grass was the setting of some random memory of El.

Mike drove further, and eventually the spattering of buildings started to peter out. Then, Mike and Thirteen were surrounded only by a dark and threatening forest.

_Mirkwood._

Mike stopped the car. 

“Are we here?” Thirteen asked, squinting through the trees, searching for any indication that the lab was nearby.

“No, no. I just… I just remembered that this forest was where I met your mom,” Mike said softly. Thirteen looked at him, not knowing what to say.

“I’m sorry,” Mike said, shaking his head and letting off the brakes. 

“It’s okay,” Thirteen said, trying to imagine what it would be like to lose El after knowing her for so long. She longed to see her mom just as much as Mike, but she’d never really had to lose her.

Finally, Mike and Thirteen arrived at the lab. The tall chainlink fence that surrounded the building was now the only thing separating them from the building. Large graffitied signs read ‘CLOSED’ and ‘KEEP OUT’ beneath their spray-paint. Mike stopped the car and got out, walking to the trunk. Thirteen followed suit, and watched Mike open the back of the car. He revealed a huge metal tool, his Supercom, and a flashlight, and set off toward the fence. He turned on the flashlight and handed it to Thirteen, to hold for him. Thirteen watched, amazed, as her father started to cut through the metal of the fence. Mike was never particularly strong, and struggled to cut each bit of the fence, but he eventually made it through. He bent down, and crawled through the hole in the fence. He popped up on the other side, smiling at Thirteen. 

“Ready?” He asked, wiping sweat off his forehead.

Thirteen nodded nervously, and crawled through the fence. Now, she was staring up at the dark, unlit building, lurking in the pitch black night sky. Mike reached his hand toward her’s, to silently tell her that it would be okay. The two set off together, hand in hand. 

A second car, that of Dr. Taylor, had been impatiently inching behind Mike’s, like a cat about to pounce. Dr. Taylor had been following Thirteen from Hawkins to Louisville, and then back to Hawkins. She was tired of waiting, but when their car had disappeared down a dirt road and into the forest, she finally understood where they were going. Dr. Taylor crept into the forest behind them, with her headlights off and her car only producing a deceptively gentle hum.


	14. Today, We Make Contact

Mike and Thirteen got to the entrance of the building. A chain wrapped around the doors, with one cartoonishly large lock holding it together. This was the newest thing about the site, and the only thing that didn’t have any graffiti on it. Mike guessed that older locks had been broken by local teenagers trying to get inside the “haunted” building. 

Mike picked a nearby rock, and hit it against the lock, mimicking the way he’d watched Nancy break into the shed at school, back in 1983. Admittedly, it took Mike a few more tries to break the lock than Nancy had, but Mike decided that it was because his lock was newer than the one in ’83.

When he got the lock off, Mike opened the door and let Thirteen into the building first. She cautiously stepped inside, and her eyes scanned the building’s lobby. It hadn’t aged well, with broken glass and graffiti everywhere she looked. The lab was colder than it was outside, despite their being no wind. Mike and Thirteen proceeded to walk slowly to the hallway, blindly looking for somewhere the gate could have been.

Mike opened various doors, finding nothing indicating a closed entrance to another dimension. Thirteen followed him, but her mind wasn’t on the gate, or the Mind Flayer, or even her mother. Thirteen could only think about how similar this building was to the one where she was held prisoner. She lightly gripped her right arm with her left hand, feeling the burn mark through her jacket. The dark hallways, the empty rooms with the tables and chairs, and the feeling that she would never get out were all too familiar. 

Thirteen felt her heartbeat speed up, and she found herself gasping for air. She was tired, but a new kind of exhaustion came over her, and she leaned against a wall. Mike noticed that his daughter wasn’t right behind him as she had just been, and he rushed to her side.

“Thirteen? Thirteen, what’s going on?” Mike asked, concerned. Thirteen was resting her right hand over her beating heart, and her left hand was gripping the bottom of her jacket, holding on for dear life. She looked up at Mike, panicked. She had tears in her eyes, and she felt pains in her chest. The world around her was terrifying, and everywhere she looked, she felt danger lurking in the darkness.

“Thirteen, breathe, breathe. It’s okay, just breathe. Focus on me, I’m right here Thirteen. I got you, it’s okay, just breathe.”

Dr. Taylor heard the voice around the corner, and stopped dead. She had caught up with them. She peeked out from behind her corner, to see the Supercom and flashlight lying abandoned on the ground. Thirteen was on the floor with Mike Wheeler kneeling over her, holding her. Dr. Taylor hid herself once more, and waited for Mike’s voice to quell Thirteen’s loud, panicked breathing.

The panic faded away, and Thirteen was eventually able to take deep breaths in unison with her father, through her sobs. Mike held onto her tightly, as he used to with El, when her PTSD-related anxiety would flare up. 

Thirteen collected herself, and Mike wiped the tears from her face with his shirt. He helped her stand up, and they both stayed frozen for another minute, holding each other. Finally, they started walking again. 

“I think it’s this way,” Thirteen said, now leading her father through the maze of hallways, power back in her voice. They approached a clear plastic sheet lying abandoned on the ground. Mike nudged it with his foot, and noticed an orange biohazard symbol printed on the plastic. This must be it.

Thirteen and Mike walked carefully down the hallway as if they were in a haunted house, waiting for something to jump out at them. Mike and Thirteen were only surprised to find a horrible smell greeting them. They pulled their shirts up over their noses. Whoever had been responsible for cleaning up the lab after the demodogs had avoided this part of the lab, for good reason. Mike and Thirteen hesitantly boarded the old elevator, and let themselves sink into the site of the lab’s greatest secret.

This part of the lab seemed more haunted than the rest of it combined. The bodies had been taken out, but the broken glass and blood stains were left behind. Mike and Thirteen both felt goosebumps, but they courageously stepped forward. 

They were both so busy taking in their surroundings, that they had fallen silent. But they had unconsciously clasped hands, and Thirteen had moved closer to her father’s body for comfort. The dust from the thirty-five years without cleaning was heavy in their throats, reminding them of the basement’s unsettling feeling even when they blinked.

Mike approached the cracked wall, a broken centerpiece in the demolished room. He ran his fingers through a small crack. This was where the gate had been. The monstrous cracks in the wall resembled lightning, reaching up to the ceiling and eventually splintering off like crooked fingers on a broken arm. The arms reached out from a large part of the wall that was cracked off and missing. This must be the part of the wall that had once housed the doorway to the other dimension. 

Thirteen sat down on a piece of rubble, staring into the gate. It once had been a doorway, but now, it was just like a piece of the wall had fallen, revealing the cement structure that held together the basement. It wouldn’t have looked particularly threatening if she could just ignore the towering cracks in the wall and the bloodied glass scattered across the floor. But Thirteen knew that behind that cement wall was a shadowy world where violent monsters lived, waiting for their chance to return to her world. 

Should she really introduce all those monsters back into this lab? Into this world? Max’s voice echoed in her head.

A _ll you’re going to do is let out all of the Upside Down’s monsters._

But what if Eleven was there, waiting for her to come save her? Waiting to see Mike again? Waiting to give her a real name, and be part of a family? Now it was Steve’s voice she heard.

_The Mind Flayer, demodogs, demogorgons, and whatever else is living in there now…_

_Eleven._

Eleven was living in there now. Mike was almost sure of it, and so was Thirteen. She had to be there. She _had_ to be. Some hidden part of Thirteen’s mind told her so. Something had happened, something bad, and her mother was sent back to the Upside Down. Thirteen felt some repressed memory silently screaming out, but she couldn’t hear what it was saying. But it didn’t matter, because all she knew was that El Wheeler was lost in another dimension, and Thirteen was the only person that could save her. 

She stood up and walked closer to the gate. Thirteen felt her exhaustion melt away as adrenaline took its place. 

“Radio,” she said to Mike, who jumped at her voice. Nobody had spoken in nearly ten minutes, and he had grown used to the silence. Mike held up his Supercom and turned it on. It was set on the ground in front of Thirteen, who opted to stand. 

“If you see her, can you tell her I love her? And- And that I haven’t stopped looking for her?” Mike whispered. Thirteen nodded at him, sadness briefly flashing over her determined expression.

“Are you scared?” Mike asked her.

“No,” Thirteen said. But she knew it was a lie. She was terrified of the monster and all of the horrible things it was capable of. She was afraid of the Upside Down, and of finding her mom. There were a million things that could go wrong, but Thirteen knew they didn’t matter. She _had_ to open this gate, to save her mother and to save her father. Thirteen choked her fear back and replaced it with all the bravery she could summon. She glared forward, staring into the empty wall.

She pulled her blindfold out of her pocket, along with her picture of Lucas, Mike, and El. Mike helped her securely tie the blindfold around her eyes, and the ghost of the gate disappeared from her view. Thirteen held the picture to her chest and began searching for her mother. 

Thirteen lost herself in the Supercom’s static. Its noise circled around her until it was all she heard, as Mike’s breathing melted away. Soon, the Supercom’s sounds faded too, and Thirteen was alone, in silence. She opened her eyes.

The darkness of the void was all around her for the third time that weekend. She was almost used to staring into the nothingness, searching for some missing parent. But as usual, Eleven was nowhere to be found. Thirteen tried as hard as she could to find some sign of her mother, yet only the darkness remained. Thirteen waited in that darkness for several minutes, before she realized what had attracted the Mind Flayer when she first searched for her mother. She had been sitting there in the void, angry and numb. It had seemed like her pain had called the monster.

It wasn’t difficult for Thirteen to focus on her pain again. All she had to do was touch her burn mark or her tattoo, and think about all the years she had suffered. She had been hardly alive through her past year, handcuffed to her cold, metal bed, forced to set fires, and barely being fed at all. She had lived like a dog. She didn’t know her family, she wasn’t given a real name, and she existed to be a prop for Dr. Taylor. Thirteen had grown up with pain in the place of love, and it had changed her. She probably would never get to live a normal life. She might never even get the chance to meet her mother.

Thirteen found herself crying, with her hands over her face. Her heart was filled with emptiness, partnered with what felt like an incurable sadness. Thirteen moved her hands away from her face. She saw through her blurry tears that the darkness around her was turning that blood red color again. The Mind Flayer would be here soon. 

Thirteen braced herself for her second meeting with the Mind Flayer. The hidden part of Thirteen’s mind told her that this monster had taken away so much from her. Her mother was stolen from her, and this _demon_ had been the thing that took her. Thirteen lacked the vocabulary to say exactly what about the monster repelled her, but her brain and her heart were unified though an ancient, almost primitive, anger.

The Mind Flayer appeared in the haze of red, bringing along its icy winds. This time, Thirteen didn’t enjoy the chills she got from the wind. She actually craved the heat she had fought for so long. 

Thirteen glared up at the Mind Flayer, standing her ground. She ignored the goosebumps on her arms, and let the cold winds wipe the tears from her cheeks. She leaned her head down slightly, and her eyes shot daggers at the Mind Flayer, unconsciously mimicking the deadly stare of Eleven.

The Mind Flayer reached towards Thirteen again. This time, it was determined to reach her. The winds picked up as the monster’s tornado-like arms reached closer to Thirteen. She ignored her own shivers, and clenched her fists at her side. The Mind Flayer had already gotten close to her, and her hair and jacket flew backwards in response. It was just a few feet away when it started to slow down, as if to savor the moment. Thirteen felt fear come over her, masking her anger. Facing this monster was like walking into a storm. But she would walk through any storm to see her mother.

Thirteen felt herself step forward, reaching a hand out to touch the swirling arm in front of her. They were now reaching for each other, as if they were parodying Michelangelo’s _The Creation of Adam._

Thirteen knew she was mere centimeters from touching her enemy, and in the next instant, the swirling winds had reached her, traveling around her body and making her into the eye of the storm. Thirteen closed her freezing eyes, and heard the spinning sounds of the Mind Flayer turn into a rumbling. 

She opened her eyes, and all she saw was darkness, and that same rumbling sound. She reached up to her eyes, and pulled the blindfold off. Lights were flickering, and for a few seconds, Thirteen couldn’t recognize her surroundings. When her eyes adjusted, she saw that she was back in the basement of the lab. Mike was frozen, staring at the wall, with his mouth hanging open. It had vines reaching out of each crack. A strange light was pouring out of the doorway, glowing orange and blue, with strings of some unfamiliar Upside Down goo was growing, grabbing itself and linking together in front of the gate.

The gate was reopened. But to Thirteen’s surprise, there was no Mind Flayer reaching out of it, or at least not yet. Mike snapped to his senses, and backed away from the gate. He grabbed Thirteen and pulled her to the back of the room with him. The picture in her hand fluttered to the ground.


	15. The Other Experiment

Steve was driving as fast as he could, as a growing feeling told him that he would be too late. As fast as he went, Lucas’s car was still tailgating his. Lucas hadn’t noticed that he was driving so close to Steve’s police car, as he was busy worrying about Thirteen and Mike. Lucas only backed off from Steve’s car when Steve exited the highway, and Lucas snapped back into reality. 

Steve turned his siren off when he reached the Welcome to Hawkins sign. The whole town would be asleep, and the last thing he needed was everyone waking up and attention being called to the lab. Besides, he had never seen a car on the road in Hawkins past 1:00am. Steve and Lucas zipped through their hometown, and made their way to the lab. They had reached the forest when Steve started to slow down. A strange rumbling sound had started, and the further they went, the louder it got. Steve stopped his car, and Lucas crossed into the left lane, rolling down Jonathan’s window to ask Steve what was going on.

“What the hell is that?” Lucas yelled through the window.

“No idea!” Steve yelled back.

“Earthquake?” suggested Jonathan.

“No, It’s not an earthquake,” Max said, appearing in Steve’s window. The group sat in the cars, knowing in the back of their minds where the rumbling was coming from. Will rolled down his window.

“She’s opened the gate,” he said.

Lucas didn’t wait for anyone to respond. He stepped on the gas and sped off toward the lab. Steve followed him now, muttering “Shit, shit, shit,” under his breath. The two cars pulled in front of the lab, and everyone climbed out quickly.

“Does anyone know who’s car this is?” Lucas asked. Mike’s car was parked right in front of the chain link fence, but a second car, small and white, was parked behind his. Nobody answered his question. They elected to ignore the unfamiliar car, and continue into the building. They climbed through the hole in the fence that Mike had made, not caring that the fence kept snagging their clothes. They ran into the building, with Lucas leading the group. Will was the last one into the building, feeling like he was walking into his worst nightmare.

 

———

 

Mike was holding Thirteen, who had a familiar nosebleed. She was clinging to her dad’s arm, staring into the light of the gate. They were expecting something sinister to burst out of it at any second.

Dr. Taylor emerged from the shadows. With the gate rumbling so loudly, they hadn’t heard the elevator humming or her footsteps approaching. 

“Thirteen,” she said, walking in front of gate, using it’s glowing light like a spotlight. Thirteen stared up at the silhouette of her captor, and tried to scream, but no sound came out. 

“Who-” Mike started, but his daughter’s reaction to this woman told him everything he needed to know. 

“I’m Dr. Taylor,” she said, simply.

“What the hell is wrong with you, keeping Thirteen in a basement for so long? How dare you keep her away from me!” Mike blurted out, unable to contain his rage. 

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I had to.”

“Had to? _Had to?_ ” Mike shouted, standing up to face his daughter’s captor.

“Dr. Brenner’s experiments weren’t finished, thanks to Eleven, and I had to continue them, to know what he could have accomplished.”

Mike stuttered angry, unable to find the words to express his hatred for this monster.

“Can I explain my side of things?” Dr. Taylor asked, and took Mike’s silence as a yes.

“I’m Dr. Taylor. Also known as Twelve.”

Mike and Thirteen both were shocked, as she pulled up her sleeve to reveal a tattered ace bandage. She unraveled the bandage, and displayed her tattoo. _012_. Above the tattoo was a large scratch mark, only a few days old. That was where Thirteen had stabbed at her with the broken soap bottle, on the day she made her escape.

“I was a few years younger than Eleven. I was another subject of the MKUltra experiments. I knew her,” she added, smiling at Mike and Thirteen, although her smile came off as menacing in the dim light.

“I was never as powerful as Eleven,” she continued. “Actually, I never showed any signs of having powers. They kept me isolated from Eleven and the other experiments, so I didn’t know I could have powers like them. So, they let me go, a few years before this gate was opened in 1983. They dropped me at an orphanage in Ohio when I was about eight years old. And it was hard, trying to adjust to life outside of this lab. I feel like I never did get used to the outside world. I thought every second of every day about what happened to me in this lab. I thought about the experiments and the punishments, and as I got older, I started to look more into the scientific aspects of it. I learned about Hawkins Lab closing, and the rumors about what they did inside. I learned about a girl with psychic powers. And I was jealous, because I wanted to be the girl with the special powers. I had the tattoo and the scars from my childhood, but nothing to show for it.

“My interest in the lab’s experiments evolved into an interest in science. I was adopted into a nice family, the Taylors, and they payed for me to go to college. I became a scientist, studying the brain. I never stopped thinking about what my brain could be capable of, if I only knew how to test it. I collected everything I could from the lab. I came back here, broke in, and found Dr. Brenner’s notes. And an old VHS tape of Eleven using her powers to crush a can. I learned about the other dimension, and some monsters that lived in there, but Brenner’s original experiment is what fascinated me.

"I wanted to find away to continue Dr. Brenner’s experiments. I knew that it wouldn’t work on me, but I needed to find someone who could have the powers. That’s when I learned about Eleven being pregnant. She was the most powerful experiment, and any child of hers would surely inherit those powers. So, I moved to Hawkins and got hired in the maternity ward of the hospital. Then, I just waited for Eleven to go into labor. When she did, I quickly got her into a room alone, and I tried to deliver the baby alone. But Eleven was screaming, and all these particles appeared around her; I’ve never seen anything like it. She disappeared, and when the dust calmed down, she was gone. But the baby was left behind, so I took her.”

Mike’s head was spinning. This woman was insane. She had seen the worst of those experiments, in person, and she still wanted to _continue_ them? But Mike couldn’t stop himself from trying to figure out what had happened with Eleven. El _had_ disappeared out of thin air. It sounded just like it happened just like it had when she killed the demogorgon, but there was no demogorgon there. If it was the same way she had disappeared in 1983, she would have gone to the Upside Down, which means he had been right. 

“I raised Thirteen by myself. She wasn’t given a name until she was 10, when I gave her the tattoo. I think I had learned pretty quickly to emotionally separate myself from Thirteen. I had to inflict pain on her, and I knew it was for science, and to understand what the brain could be capable of. At first, I had thought that she was like me; no powers. But she thankfully proved me wrong, and I hit my first breakthrough. I kept pushing her further to get better results, and it was working. But then, after her first successful escape attempt, I think I lost myself in my anger, and I hurt her too bad. I still feel really guilty, because that wasn’t science, that was like what they did to me in the lab. When I didn’t voluntarily participate in the experiments, they hurt me, badly. That’s what I did to Thirteen, and it was too severe. 

“After that, I started to get attached to her, because I realized that she was a lot like me. I told her a little bit about Eleven, so she could start to understand why I had hurt her. I’m not a bad person. I took extreme measures to advance science, and to prove to the world what our minds can do. And Thirteen was just a part of that. I’m truly sorry it affected your family like this, Mike, but I had to do what I did. Scientifically, I believe the ends justify the means, because the ends are so profound. It's impossible to achieve the scientific breakthroughs that Brenner and I got without some pain along the way. I feel incredibly guilty for what I’ve done, but look what we’ve achieved!” She finished, gesturing to the gate.

“You’re insane. Insane,” whispered Mike, shaking his head. Twelve frowned at him, as if she had believed that he would understand her actions. Twelve’s casual behavior and apparent humanness shocked Mike, but it couldn’t make up for how eerily icy her tone was. Twelve was as cold and as creepy as Dr. Brenner was. However, even though she somehow seemed to care less about other people’s pain than Brenner had, she still was strangely human. But Mike knew she was wrong. No amount of that pain was worth a ‘scientific breakthrough’.

Thirteen tried to say something from behind Mike. Twelve and Mike looked at her, waiting for her to repeat. Thirteen stood up weakly, using the wall for balance. 

“I’m nothing like you,” she said, glaring at Twelve. In a burst of anger, she stretched her hands out in front of her and let out a loud grunt, sounding more like a growl. Mike jumped away from the heat instinctively, as Thirteen’s hands turned black with charcoal. The bandage wrapped loosely around Twelve’s left arm was set on fire. Twelve yelped and jumped back, dropping the smoking bandage on the ground.

Thirteen slumped back onto the ground, unconscious. She hadn’t done much damage to the bandage, but combined with her earlier efforts to open the gate, she was exhausted. Mike ran to her side.

“Thirteen!” cried Mike, making sure his daughter hadn’t injured herself in her fall. Twelve stamped the fire out.

A mechanical sound began ringing nearby, that Mike recognized as the elevator. Mike stood up, grabbing a small, but heavy, piece of the broken, cement wall. He held the cement up like a weapon, ready to protect Thirteen from whoever was about to enter the room next.

Lucas’s face appeared. 

“Lucas? What the hell are you doing here?” Mike let the cement fall to the ground with a thunk, spitting out a fresh cloud of dust.

“You opened the gate? Are you crazy? What the hell happened-” Lucas caught a glimpse of the body behind Mike, “Is Thirteen okay? And who’s that?” Lucas shouted, overflowing with questions. The concerned faces of Nancy, Max, and Dustin appeared behind him, and Mike was sure that the rest of their group was behind them.

“She’s okay, just tired. Is Steve with you?” Mike said, trying to find Steve’s face among those poking out from behind Lucas, who was frozen in shock.

“Right here!” called Steve, pushing his way through the group, and almost knocking Lucas off his feet. “What’s going on?”

“Do you have your cuffs on you?” Mike asked.

“Yeah, I brought them incase I needed to arrest you,” Steve truthfully said, distracted by the sight of the gate.

“Arrest that woman,” Mike instructed, pointing to Twelve. “That’s Twelve, also known as Dr. Taylor, the woman who imprisoned my daughter for eighteen years. And don’t worry, she doesn’t have powers.” 

Steve didn’t say a word, but put his cuffs on Twelve, who didn’t fight back with force.

“You can’t arrest me, or I’ll tell the world about the truth about the lab, and about Eleven and Thirteen, and their powers,” she said.

“We’ll worry about her later,” Mike said. “Right now, I need you guys to get Thirteen out of here. I’m going through the gate.”

The group objected, but Steve simply took a second pair of handcuffs out of his pocket, and tossed them to Lucas. 

“Back-up cuffs. In case I needed to arrest Thirteen too,” he said, sleepily, still staring at the gate.

Lucas walked forward to cuff Mike. Mike struggled at first, but Lucas had always been stronger than him, and there was no use fighting him. While Lucas was cuffing Mike, Nancy and Dustin went to check on Thirteen.

“She’s drained, just like El used to get when she used her powers too much,” Dustin said, picking her up gently. 

They left the lab together, deciding to worry about the gate after they’d had a couple more hours of sleep. It was nearly four in the morning now, and nobody in the group could think straight. They all went back to Lucas’s house, with Mike and Twelve in the back of Steve’s police car. Max and Dustin crowded into Lucas’s car, resting Thirteen over their laps.


	16. I'm Sorry Too

Back at Lucas’s house, The group grabbed as many blankets as they could find, and they slept anywhere they found space. Thirteen was laid gently on the guest room bed, and Mike was handcuffed to the bottom of Lucas’s bedpost and given a sleeping bag. They were hesitant to take off his cuffs, because of how he had taken off earlier that night. Twelve was left in the kitchen, with no blanket. Steve made sure that there was nothing in her reach, and left her slumped in front of the refrigerator.

Most of the group fell immediately into a deep sleep, but Jonathan was wide awake. It had been one of the longest nights of his life, but he still couldn’t sleep. Something about being back in that lab reminded him of what a coward he was. Dead weight. When he was a teenager, it was Nancy who solved all the mysteries. It was his mother who saved Will. He didn’t save Bob, he didn’t believe that Will was alive. What _did_ he do? 

Jonathan had developed severe anxiety from the events in the 80s, and he couldn't shake the feeling that what happened to El, Will, Bob, Barb, and Mike was preventable. If Jonathan had been smarter and braver, he could have stopped some of it. 

Jonathan got up and stumbled through the dark, making his way to the kitchen. He walked to the fridge, but he had forgotten that Twelve was laying in front of it, cuffed to the door handle. She was awake, and looking at him blankly.

“Sorry,” he muttered, and went to leave.

“It’s okay. I can move if you want to get something to eat,” she replied. Jonathan’s stomach grumbled, and he turned back around. Twelve opened the refrigerator door for him, and its white light illuminated her face. Jonathan avoided her gaze, and grabbed a chocolate pudding from the fridge. He grabbed a second one, and handed it to Twelve. Twelve closed the door and sat with her back against the fridge. Jonathan got two spoons out of Lucas’s drawer, and passed one to Twelve. Jonathan leaned against the counter, and began eating his pudding. 

“Why did you do it? Keep Thirteen locked up like that, and hurting her. You’re named Twelve, which means you saw the inside of the lab. How could you make her go through what you went through?” Jonathan asked her.

“I told Mike this earlier tonight, that I believe that the ends justify the means. I do feel guilty for how I achieved those ends, but I had to understand what the human brain can do when it experiences extreme conditions. I had to face what scared me most, but it was worth it to me, once I saw what Thirteen could do.”

“You faced what scared you most?” Jonathan asked.

“Yes, I did. I think that to get past any kind of trauma, you have to face it head on. To understand why it happened. To me, that meant understanding why the scientists hurt me, and once I’d learned what we could be capable of, I had to understand the connection between abuse, pain, and emotion, and these psychic powers. Understand what I mean? It’s not about getting lost in your obsession with the past, it’s about analyzing what you’ve been through, and using it to advance yourself.”

“I think I do understand, at least a little,” Jonathan said. “But I think that forcing a child to go through the same pain you did, to- what, understand why you went through pain? -is counterproductive, and it just makes you the same as those who hurt you. It makes you from a victim into an abuser.”

Twelve’s expression turned sour, and started to speak, to defend her actions again, but Jonathan interrupted her.

“My dad was abusive. To me, my brother, and my mom. Do you honestly think that I should have a son and abuse him, just to understand why my dad did the same to me? No. No, I know why my dad abused us, it was because he was an asshole who didn’t love us. I knew that from a young age, and I’ve been telling myself for 50 years that I wasn’t going to end up like him, no matter what. Screw that. 

“You know, I think you might be right about facing trauma, but that’s not what you did. You took the same trauma that you went through, and that El went through, and you spread it to Thirteen. Now, she’s going to have that same trauma that you and El had, and I’m going to personally make sure that it doesn’t eat her up like it did to you.” Jonathan struggled to keep his voice low, and not wake the whole house. He threw his empty pudding cup away, and placed the spoon in the sink. He walked out of the kitchen, and returned to his blanket and pillow on the living room floor. He finally got himself to sleep this time, and he was the last person to wake up in the morning.

The rest of the group was up at 10am, but they were still tired. They let Jonathan sleep longer, but most of the group wanted to eat. Steve and Dustin went out to the breakfast restaurant in Hawkins, Bagel Cafe, and brought back a large bag full of every imaginable bagel and donut flavor. Nancy, Max, Dustin, Steve, and Mike, who was out of his handcuffs and wasn’t feeling very fond of the group at the moment, ate their bagels together. Max tossed a single plain bagel to Twelve, who remained handcuffed to the refrigerator door. 

Thirteen woke up finally, and walked into Lucas’s kitchen, confused. The last thing she remembered was setting Twelve’s bandage on fire, and then she was waking up at Lucas’s house.

She sat down at the table next to Mike, staring angrily at Twelve, who stared back. Steve selected a chocolate chip donut for Thirteen, and spread a strawberry cream cheese on it. Thirteen bit into the bagel, and smiled. It was so sweet, the perfect way to wake up.

Lucas walked into the kitchen next, and helped himself to a cinnamon bagel. Jonathan was the last into the kitchen, and he had the last sesame bagel, which he stood eating, as there weren’t any empty chairs left. The group talked about their families and their jobs, catching up with each other. Max told the group about the soccer game that her youngest son had won last week, and showed pictures of her boys. Steve showed pictures of his twins at their 8th birthday party. Dustin pulled out his wallet and showed off his 16 year old daughter’s drawings, jokingly asking Will if she could go to his art school for free. Finally, they stopped talking about their families, and the conversation took a more serious turn.”

“So, what’s the plan for today?” asked Max.

“What do we do with the gate?” Steve asked.

“I want to go through it. I know what you’re going to say, but I think El’s stuck in there, and I have to go find her.” Mike said.

“Mike,” Nancy started, but knew she couldn’t reason with her brother.

“Mike, we want El to be alive more than anything, you know that, but this isn’t safe.” Dustin said.

“I don’t care-” Mike started to say, but Steve cut him off.

“You should care, you have a daughter to think about now.”

Thirteen wasn’t listening, and kept glancing over her shoulder to make sure that Twelve was still stuck by the fridge.

“I think we have to go back to the lab,” Max said. “We have to make sure it doesn’t spread, and we have to see if there's a way to close it before it does.”

“Yeah, it’s out of the question to just go home and ignore it,” said Steve.

“Thirteen, do you think you can close it?” Nancy asked, and Thirteen stopped looking at Twelve and rejoined the conversation.

“I don’t know how,” said Thirteen, shaking her head. Like Mike, she wanted to go through the gate to find her mother. But with Dr. Taylor there, all the determination and power that drove her was gone.

“When me and Nancy saw the gate before it was closed, they were burning it, to ‘contain it’. It wasn’t working very well, but maybe if you burn it, something will happen,” Jonathan offered. Thirteen nodded.

“I can try,” she said. 

“What about me?” Twelve said loudly.

“We’re not letting you go,” Steve said firmly. “We’re going to figure out what to do with you after the gate is closed. I guess we can bring you back to the lab with us, so you stay in my sight.”

Lucas and Dustin went to go pick up Mike’s car, which was left at the lab, to make it easier to transport the group to and from the gate. 

While they were waiting, Thirteen and Max found themselves alone together in the guest room. Max had wandered in, with something she wanted to say to Thirteen, but didn’t have the nerve.

“Hey, Thirteen.”

“Hi, Max.”

“Um, I just wanted to say something,” Max started, but trailed off. Thirteen looked at her, waiting.

“I wanted to say that you remind me a lot of Eleven. Not because of your powers, or the tattoo or anything, but because you’re brave. And you're a good person, despite your past. I admire that.”

“I don’t feel like a good person,” Thirteen responded. “I get mad, and I hurt people, like Dr. Taylor.”

“Everyone gets mad, Thirteen. It’s okay. I get angry a lot, actually. When I was your age, my nickname was Madmax.”

“MadThirteen,” Thirteen said, smiling at Max, who laughed.“But I can’t control my anger,” Thirteen continued. “I’m scared I’ll hurt more people, or that all I’ll ever feel is anger.”

“I feel that way sometimes too. When I was a kid, my stepbrother would get mad, and he’d hurt me. And I was always scared that I would become like him. So I learned ways to handle my anger. I would try to take deep breaths, but that never helped much. I started boxing. For me, it helps to hit something when I get really upset. When I heard about your mom going missing, that’s all I did. I felt guilty for leaving Hawkins years earlier, and missing all that time with her. And I was angry, with myself and with the whole situation. It was unfair, you know?”

“Yeah. It makes me angry too. The whole situation,” Thirteen repeated.

“But I want you to know that being angry doesn’t make you a bad person. Its okay to be mad. You’ve been through a lot, and if your response to that is anger, then that’s okay. Being angry doesn’t make you like Dr. Taylor. And it doesn’t make me like my stepbrother. Because those people hurt us on purpose, and they don’t feel guilty for it. We’re the ones trying to move on from our anger, and that’s good. And sometimes, anger is good. Your mom told me once that she was really bitter about how she was treated by the lab, and she learned how use her anger to channel her powers. She said that her past made her strong, and she could use her powers to help other people. She said that she used her anger to close the gate. Maybe you could do the same,” Max said. Thirteen nodded.

They heard tires on the driveway outside, and Max left Thirteen in the guest room. While the group prepared to leave for the lab again, Lucas went into the guest room to talk to Thirteen.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey,” Thirteen replied. They hadn’t talked any since yesterday, when Lucas had made her angry, and she had set Mike’s trash can on fire. It felt like a hundred years ago, and a lot had happened since then, but Thirteen still felt a spark of anger at what Lucas had said.

“I’m sorry about what happened yesterday. I didn’t mean it,” Lucas started.

“It’s okay. I’m sorry, too.” 

At those words, Lucas was reminded of his apology to Eleven, in 1983. He had called her a traitor, and she had used her powers to throw him backwards in the junkyard. Then, Eleven had saved them from the bad men, by flipping the van, and Lucas had apologized to her. Eleven’s voice was so clear in Lucas’s memory. That had been the day that Lucas and El had really become friends.

_Friends don’t lie. I’m sorry too._

“Y-you are strong. I didn’t mean that you weren’t.” Lucas said, trying to clear that memory from his mind. “I mean, did you see how you set that trash can on fire? It was amazing, honestly,” Lucas smiled at her.

Thirteen smiled back.

“Knock, knock,” Dustin said, appearing in the doorway. “I think we’re all ready to go out here,” he said.

“Are you ready?” Lucas asked Thirteen, who nodded.


	17. Fire + Ice

Before she knew it, Thirteen was back in front of the gate. The group had driven quickly to the lab, and now that they knew the way to the basement, it had been easy to navigate through the lab.

Dustin led the way, followed closely by Steve and Twelve. Steve had brought Twelve along, nervous to leave her in the car. Kids came to vandalize the lab all the time, and Steve didn’t want Twelve convincing those kids to let her out, or telling them about what was happening inside. Plus, seeing a cop car outside the lab would scare any kids off. 

Will, Max, and Nancy walked together. Max was speeding up, determined to get to the gate, and Will matched her pace. However, Will’s mind wasn’t on the gate. He could only think about all the trips he took to this building when he was younger, and the monsters that had followed him each day. He raced Max through the long hallways, feeling like he was running through the Upside Down from those monsters again. Nancy kept her steady pace, though she turned around to encourage Thirteen to keep going every thirty seconds.

The group crowded into the elevator. Nancy stopped speaking to Thirteen, as she couldn’t hear over the loud, screeching, mechanical sounds of an elevator that hadn’t been oiled since the 80s.

Thirteen was the last off the elevator and moved slowly through the hallways and into the room with the gate. Nancy’s encouraging words and Lucas and Mike’s presence on either side of her had kept her moving, but fear was creeping up on her with each step and she wasn’t sure that she could do it. Thirteen had stopped in the doorway and let Mike and Lucas go ahead of her. She took a deep breath and remembered what Max had said about El.

_She learned how use her anger to channel her powers. Her past made her strong, and she could use her powers to help other people._

Thirteen wanted to help more than anything. The anxious and eager faces of the people crowded in the room told her that she needed to do this for them. She took a second deep breath and stepped into the room, pushing her fear down.

The room glowed orange. With all the chaos of last night, nobody had really been able to focus on the gate. Now, the group stood staring into its light, frozen.

Thirteen broke the stillness by stepping closer. She walked to the same spot as last night, glaring into the gate, until something caught her eye. She looked down, and saw the photo of El, Mike, and Lucas, still resting on the ground where it was dropped last night. Thirteen bent to pick it up. She looked at her mothers face, hardly able to make out the details in the dark red light. Closing that gate meant she would never find her mother in the Upside Down. 

Thirteen turned to looked back at Mike. Mike walked forward, eyes glued to the picture. She handed it to him, and he held it gently, tears on his face. Thirteen knew exactly what he was thinking. Closing that gate meant he would never find his wife in the Upside Down. Mike looked up from the picture, and stared at the gate. He shook his head, and looked at his daughter.

“You have to close it.”

“But-” Thirteen started, as a tear fell halfway to her cheek and stopped, reflecting a glimmer of orange light.

“I don’t know that she’s in there. And I don’t want you, or anyone else to get hurt trying to find her. It’s not what she’d want,” Mike said, looking back to El’s face in the photo.

“Okay,” Thirteen said, wiping the tear from her face.

Mike held on to the photo and walked backwards to give Thirteen some space.

Thirteen started to turn back around to face the gate, but instead stopped when she saw Twelve. Anger shot through her and Thirteen could already feel herself getting warmer. That woman had ruined everything for her. Memories flashed through Thirteen’s mind, and suddenly she was running through the hallways, being burnt by the poker, being tied to the bed, and being forced to set fire to anything Dr. Taylor wanted, all over again. Years of pain were bubbling to the surface again, and Thirteen could hardly control her anger. She quickly jerked her body to face the gate and reached her hands toward it, right as she let out a scream. 

The glowing orange light became brighter as the gate burned. The weak lights of the lab were flickering. Fire licked through the cracks on the wall, reaching every vine. A horrible hissing sound screamed back at Thirteen, and everyone in the group had to cover their ears. Mike felt himself slip onto the floor behind Thirteen. 

 

———

 

Mike was back in November, 1983. He was sitting in Mr. Clarke’s classroom, watching El defeat the Demogorgon. He had his hands to his ears as he cried, powerless, as he watched her disappear with the monster.

He blinked, and he was back in April, 2018. He was sitting on the floor of the lab, watching his daughter burn the gate. He had his hands to his ears as he cried, powerless, and he was sure that he was about to watch her disappear too.

 

———

 

Thirteen’s screams continued, and the burning gate spewed orange light. The lightbulbs on the ceiling flickered a blue light that was dwarfed by the brightness of the fire. Blood streamed down Thirteen’s face.

Will’s eyes were stuck to the gate, and he blinked through the heat to watch it sizzle underneath the flames. Will was the first to see the shadow moving through the veil of fire.

As Thirteen grew weaker, a stream of grey particles began to leak through the gate, swirling slowly towards Thirteen.

“Mind Flayer,” Will whispered, unable to believe what he was seeing. “Mind Flayer! Mind Flayer!” Will shouted, pointing to the gate. The grey particles were struggling to reach Thirteen through the heat, but they had come much too close. Thirteen stopped screaming when she saw the Mind Flayer in the fire, but her fear of it didn’t outweigh her anger. She glared at it, and moved a shaking hand to face the grey arm of the Mind Flayer. She screamed again, and a wave of heat caused the arm to whip around. It thrashed around for a minute, until it lunged blindly toward the nearest person it could reach, Twelve.

Once it had reached Twelve, it didn’t seem to care about the heat. More gray particles poured out of the cracks in the gate, and flew towards Twelve. Will ran towards Thirteen and pulled her away from Twelve and the gate. Everyone quickly backed away from Twelve, and watched her get absorbed into the tornado. Thirteen’s concentration was broken, and she adjusted to the sight in front of her. She stared through the swirling dust, into the eyes of her captor. 

Twelve only saw glimpses of Thirteen’s sweaty, bloody face through the grey. The Mind Flayer was reaching into her head, and Twelve felt a pain like she’d never felt before. It was like she had become completely frozen, not only because she couldn’t move, but because the Mind Flayer’s chilling touch was colder than anything she’d ever felt. Fear, pain and ice ripped through her body, and it was all she could feel. The handcuffs sprang open somehow, and clattered to the ground. The gray particles started to fall away from her face, and retreated back into the gate. The shadow of the Mind Flayer’s face remained visible through the gate, watching to see what would happen next.

Twelve fell to her knees, fighting for breath. The group stood still, not knowing what to do. It was Will who stepped forward, despite his pounding heart.

“T-twelve? Are you alright? I m-might be the only one to understand what that felt like,” he started. Twelve suddenly shouted out, and swiped a hand at Will. Will stumbled backward, as shards of ice were thrown at him.

“Will!” Jonathan and Max exclaimed, and Jonathan ran forward to help his brother. 

“I’m okay,” Will said, as Jonathan helped him to his feet. Will had a small, bleeding gash on his face, but he ignored it and brushed the rest of the ice off of him.

Twelve was looking at her hands. There was a small trickle of blood under her nose and a disturbing smile on her lips. She focused her attention on a nearby pile of rubble on the ground, and swiped her hand again. More shards of ice were thrown at it. They looked like glass, until they struck the rubble, and a thin layer of frost appeared on it.

Twelve’s unsettling smile turned into a laugh, and she got to her feet.

“I thought I didn’t have any powers! Looks like I just needed an extra push!” Twelve said happily, still looking proudly at her hands. There was a horrifying look in her eyes, as if she was completely taken over by evil.

The group found themselves trapped in the room. Twelve was stationed right in front of the doorway, and they had no weapons to face her with. Steve stepped forward, trying to convince Twelve to let them go.

“You don’t have to hurt us. We’ll leave you be, just let us go,” Steve argued gently, approaching her slowly, with his hands up.

Twelve swung a hand at Steve, who yelped, and jumped out of the way to avoid a wave of ice shards.

Thirteen decided that had been enough. She walked out from behind Lucas and Dustin, straight to Twelve. Twelve swiped her hand at Thirteen, and Thirteen thrust her arms forward, and under that heat, Twelve was unable to make any ice shoot towards her. Twelve tried again, but Thirteen’s heat blocked her once more. Twelve abruptly crouched down and sent some ice flying. Thirteen jumped back as the shards of ice cut her legs. Thirteen’s anger bubbled up yet again. How many times was she going to let Dr. Taylor hurt her? _No more._

Thirteen stepped forward and let out a growl of anger, as her hands shot forward again. Twelve’s arm was on fire now, right where Thirteen had struck her with the soap bottle. Twelve leaned against the wall and yelled out in pain. Twelve patted out the fire and glared at Thirteen. She lowered her shoulders, and Thirteen could tell she was about to charge at her. Thirteen moved quickly to the side of the room, away from the others, so that they would be able to get out while Twelve attacked her.

Sure enough, Twelve lunged at her, grabbing her around the middle and knocking her to the floor. Twelve’s body pinned Thirteen to the ground, and with her uninjured arm, she shot ice at the girl. Thirteen shielded her face with her hands and looked back at the others.

“Go!” Thirteen shouted, motioning for the group to leave while Twelve was distracted. They hesitated, and Thirteen shouted again, “Go, now!” 

Steve, Max, and Nancy ushered Lucas and Mike out, who fought to get back to Thirteen.

“We can’t help her! She’s okay, she’s strong!” Nancy cried, as she tried to pull her brother towards the elevator.

The group finally got Mike and Lucas into the elevator, and they tore through the building together.

Meanwhile, Thirteen was winning her fight. She had managed to push Twelve off of her and had retaliated with a burn to the face. Twelve was no longer nursing her burnt arm and a shard of ice had scratched Thirteen’s face, but Thirteen could tell that Twelve was getting weaker.

Twelve lunged at Thirteen, and Thirteen tried to grab her back. Thirteen caught her left arm. It was the same spot where she had burnt her, twice before, and where she had stabbed her with the soap bottle. Thirteen’s thumb covered the 012 tattoo on her wrist, smudging charcoal over the ink. Twelve had grabbed Thirteen’s right wrist, her palm covering her burn mark. Each of them were clinging to the other, using their powers and screaming from the pain.

Thirteen couldn’t stand the cold on her burn mark, and Twelve couldn’t stand the heat on her own wounds. But they held on, and instead of letting go, they screamed louder. Ice crawled its way up Thirteen’s arm, and flames burned on Twelve’s. Ice was cracking and turning to steam.

Twelve and Thirteen were blind. There was only fire and ice, and it consumed them.

The lab exploded.


	18. Black Hole

The group had gotten out of the lab. They were going to get weapons and come back to help Thirteen, and they had just reached the fence when they turned to see it happen. The windows that hadn’t already been broken began to shatter, and the earth started to rumble. 

“Thirteen!” Lucas shouted, and Dustin held him still, just in case he was going to try to run back into the building. There was a loud explosion, and the lab was suddenly up in flames.

It wasn't a large explosion, but it was enough for the group to be sure that there was nobody left alive in the basement of the building.

“We can’t be seen here. How are we going to explain to the police what we were doing here?” Jonathan said, anxious to leave.

The group agreed, and started to leave.

Lucas gave his keys to Max, and sat in his backseat with his head in his arms. Steve and Jonathan pulled Will, who was shaking, into the police car. Max and Steve started to drive away, leaving Mike and Nancy, who were leaning against Mike’s car in silence.

“Mike, we have to go,” Nancy said through her tears. Mike was silent. Sirens started to sound in the distance, and Nancy pushed Mike into the passenger seat and quickly drove away.

Once the Hawkins fire engine had passed them, Nancy pulled over at the side of the road. 

Nancy got out of the car and ran to Mike’s side. She managed to get him out of the car, and he just looked up at her with tears in his eyes. Nancy wrapped her arms around him, and held him. 

“I’m so sorry, Mike,” Nancy whispered. She sobbed onto his shoulder. Mike hadn’t hugged her back. He just stood there, letting tears fall and staring into the distance. There was only one thought in Mike’s mind, and when he thought back to that moment, he wasn’t sure why this was the only thing he was thinking about.

_Why is she crying? She wasn’t her daughter. She barely knew her._

Of course, later Mike understand why Nancy was crying. Thirteen had been her niece, and she _had_ gotten to know her pretty well. Nancy was mourning the loss of someone who had suffered her whole life, and had never gotten to meet her mother, or experience anything real about life. Nancy was mourning Eleven, her sister-in-law, who never got to meet the brave person that her daughter was. Nancy was mourning all the people she had known who had been hurt or killed because of the lab that had just exploded.

But most of all, Nancy was crying for Mike in that moment. He had lost his wife, and now he had lost his daughter. She held onto him because she could never understand what it was like to lose someone like that. Nancy was crying for him.

Mike doesn’t remember anything else about that day. Nancy drove him home and he sat, surrounded by his friends and family, watching the news. 

Nobody mentioned Thirteen, or what had happened with the lab. The group just sat in silence, each letting themselves sob quietly or wipe tears from their faces. Each of them were silently wondering if the gate had been closed in the explosion, or if Thirteen or Twelve’s bodies would be found in the wreckage, but there was no sign of anything left in the lab. The firemen had put the fire out, but it there was still a cloud of smoke hovering over Hawkins for the rest of the day, like a ghost.

Steve and Nancy went to get takeout for everyone, but they all just picked at their food. At the end of the night, there was a mountain of food left over in Lucas’s fridge. Mike hadn’t eaten a bite, and instead just stared out Lucas’s window, watching the sunset through a curtain of hazy smoke. 

Lucas was the only one who didn’t sit with the group. When he had climbed out of Steve’s car, he had walked quickly to his house and unlocked the door. When the others had made it inside, Lucas was already shut in his room, collapsed on his bed and sobbing into a pillow.

Lucas hadn't cried like this before. Not when his dad died, when his mom started getting sick, not when Mike and El were missing, and not when he got divorced. Lucas thought back to when he was a policeman, working with Hopper.

“I used to say I was like a black hole,” Hopper had said to Lucas. It was Winter, 1998, and they had been on duty together when Lucas had heard about his dad dying. Hopper and Lucas were sitting in the police car, and Hopper had placed his hand firmly on Lucas’s shoulder, the same way he always would comfort El.

“I said that I sucked everything in and destroyed it. Just like a black hole.”

“I feel like that now,” Lucas had said, brushing away his tears. Hopper hesitated, and spoke again.

“I lost my daughter, and then my wife. And for years I’ve been afraid that the black hole was going to take El too. And Joyce, and Will and Jonathan. And even Mike,” Hopper smiled. “But It hasn’t taken them. When I lost Sarah, I just got unlucky. What I mean is that there’s no point in blaming yourself, kid. I’m not a black hole, and you aren’t either. We just got unlucky.”

But back in 2018, Lucas did feel like a black hole. He’d lost his dad, then El and Mike, then he’d gotten divorced, and his mom had gotten sick. And now, he’d lost Thirteen too. ‘Unlucky’ didn’t cover it anymore. 

There was a knock at the door. To Lucas’s surprise, it was Jonathan’s voice that spoke.

“Hey, Lucas. Thought you could use some company.”

Lucas wiped his eyes and rolled over to face Jonathan, but said nothing. Jonathan had puffy eyes and was looking from Lucas to the floor, as if he was too embarrassed to look Lucas in the eye. He closed the door and sat on the edge of the bed.

“Do you need anything? Nancy and Steve brought some food and there’s plenty of leftovers,” Jonathan started, moving the hair away from his face. Lucas just shook his head, now avoiding Jonathan’s eyes.

“Look, I’m so sorry about what happened. But-”

“You all have to go home, I know,” Lucas finished his sentence, dully. It made sense. They all had lives, families, and jobs that they had to get back to. There was nothing keeping them in Hawkins anymore.

“Yeah,” Jonathan said. “But maybe I could stay behind to help you and Mike, if you want. Steve, Nancy, Dustin, and Max all have to go home soon, but I don’t really have anything keeping me in New York anymore. And I don’t think Will’s ready to go back to Chicago.”

“How is Mike? And Will?” Lucas asked.

“I don’t know. They’ve both been really quiet,” Jonathan answered, running a hand through his hair again.

“I’m so sorry,” Lucas said, letting fresh tears fall onto his pillow. “I brought everyone here, and I didn’t stay and protect her. It’s my fault. Mike must hate me.”

“He doesn't hate you,” Jonathan assured him, tears appearing in his eyes too. “This wasn’t your fault, Lucas. I promise that Mike doesn’t blame you.”

“I blame myself for a lot of things,” Jonathan continued after a minute. “I always tell myself that if I had done more, I could have saved Bob. And El. And maybe Will wouldn’t have been taken by the monster that day, if I had been there for him.”

“That’s not fair, there’s no way you could've known that was going to happen,” Lucas argued.

“Yeah, I know. It wasn’t my fault. And this wasn’t your fault either. There’s no way you could’ve known that the lab would explode like that. We don’t even know what happened in there, but if you’d stayed, you’d be gone too. And if I’d been there for Will when the monster got him, it just would’ve gotten me too.”

Lucas and Jonathan stopped speaking after that. Jonathan was surprised at what he’d said. But he’d been right. He needed to stop blaming himself.

Jonathan and Lucas sat in silence for the rest of the night. Max, Nancy, Dustin, and Steve went in and out of the room to check on the two men, but Lucas and Jonathan were just fine with being alone together. 

At least it was all over now.


	19. The Red World

Thirteen opened her eyes. 

She coughed, and shakily tried to lift her head. Where was she? All around her was a dull, dark red color, and everything was fuzzy. She couldn’t think straight. She was laying on her side, with her knees together and her left arm underneath her body. She started to sit up, and felt her heart start to beat faster.

Her right hand was resting lightly on the cold ground. Thirteen tried to push herself up with it, but she quickly collapsed and yelped out in pain. The sound of her crying out seemed to echo all around her. Thirteen looked at her injured hand. Where her burn mark had been, there was now a heavy black mark, bursting out from behind the grey charcoal on her palm. It stretched along her arm like veins, seeming to mimic the pattern of the cracks on the wall around the gate. It grew like vines from her burn mark, reaching her shoulder, where the black lines thinned out and disappeared into her skin.

Thirteen gently rested her hand, now throbbing from the pain, against her body and used her left arm to sit up. Her eyesight was starting to adjust to the chilling redness of her surroundings. She was crouched in the middle of a room. Debris surrounded her, and the blood-red color seemed to be coming from a piece of wall missing high above her head. Thirteen recognized the room as the basement from the lab, but there was no menacing gate to the Upside Down. In its place was simply a muddy brown stain on the cracked wall. 

What happened? Thirteen remembered going to close the gate. She had started to close it, and then what? Dr. Taylor. The monster had gotten her, and she’d gotten those ice powers. Then Thirteen had made everyone leave the lab, so they wouldn’t get hurt. The last thing she remembered was holding on to Dr. Taylor.

And then she woke up here. But where was she? The building was in pieces, and Twelve was nowhere to be found. Thirteen managed to stand up, using a nearby pile of rubble as a crutch. Once she was on her feet, Thirteen started exploring the room. The hallway that led to the elevator had caved in, and it looked like the only way out of the lab was through the hole near the ceiling, where the top of the wall had crumbled away. Thirteen wiped the dried blood off her nose and started to climb up, using the cracks in the wall. Despite her exhaustion, she was determined to keep climbing towards the hole, and hopefully towards her family. 

However, when she was almost halfway up the wall, a piece broke off and she fell. Thirteen’s body hit the ground with a thud, knocking the wind out of her. Thirteen’s head should have hit the floor too, but something had cushioned its blow. She caught her breath and sat up. Behind her were two legs, sticking out from under a pile of debris.

Thirteen’s breath was gone again, and she started frantically removing rubble from the body. She knew who it was as soon as she uncovered the left arm of the body. Twelve’s arm had been cut and burned by Thirteen, but now it had an inky black spot covering those wounds. The black on her skin was identical to the black on Thirteen’s. It stretched along Twelve’s motionless arm, reaching to her fingertips and halfway up her arm. It swallowed her _012_ tattoo.

Thirteen cleared the rubble covering her captor’s face. Twelve had her eyes closed, though her light hair was covering one eye. With all the various pink cuts and burns on her face, she was hardly recognizable as the woman who had tortured Thirteen for all those years.

Thirteen backed away from the body. She was filled with this sickly bittersweet feeling. Thirteen had hated this woman, but something about how she had died wasn’t right. Thirteen had never killed anyone before now. This was a cruel person, who had probably deserved all the pain that she got, but still Thirteen was overwhelmed by guilt. 

Thirteen swayed and took a breath in. She whipped around to face the wall and punched it with all of her strength. She yelled out, in both pain and anger. Her left hand was now throbbing as much as her right hand was, but she didn’t care. Thirteen started climbing out of the lab, and this time she didn’t fall. She hoisted herself out through the opening. When she was finally outside, she rolled onto her back to take a breath. Her two injured hands fell to either side of her body, and she stared upward. The clouds were red, but there was no sun in the sky. Thirteen looked at the building in front of her. The lab was looking worse than she’d remembered. Broken glass that had clearly fallen from all the empty windows was scattered along the ground around her, and it didn’t look like the basement was the only floor that had begun to cave in. Even through the redness, the building looked discolored, almost scorched. 

Thirteen noticed it was snowing. It made sense, with how cold the earth was. But the snow didn't seem to be falling, just floating through the air. Thirteen stopped resting and sat up. She observed the snowflakes that were moving around her, and that’s when she realized that it wasn't snow at all. This was the Upside Down.

She hadn’t recognized it as the other dimension, because Lucas had described it to her as a dark, blue place. But this place was glowing an odd red color, like fresh blood. Thirteen began to panic, for the first time feeling how cold the world around her was. She started to run through the world she thought she recognized. She crawled through the opening of the chain-link fence and ran down the road. The forest around the road seemed more sinister and intimidating than ever, and Thirteen began running down the very middle of the road to avoid the dark branches extending towards her. At any moment, she expected the Mind Flayer to appear. She was trapped in its world.

Thirteen walked through Mirkwood for ages. She stopped running to save her energy for when the monsters revealed themselves. When she finally reached the town, she realized that she didn’t know where to go. If she went back to Lucas’s house, Lucas wouldn’t be there. But it was the only place she wanted to be, so she wandered through the town in search of the familiar house. 

Thirteen was pleasantly surprised to discover that she knew the way to Lucas’s house. After what felt like hours, though Thirteen couldn’t be sure, she reached the house. Thirteen walked alone down the driveway, the same way she had when she had first gone to find Lucas. She was filled with the same feeling she had that day. It was the feeling of uneasiness in a strange place, combined with the feeling of hope that this will be a safe place. But this time, the Upside Down’s vines stretched over the pavement and up the front of the brick house, and the flickering streetlights glowed pink.

Thirteen reached the front door and tried to go inside, but it was locked. She climbed through the garden to the living room window. She peered inside, knowing that she wouldn't see anyone there, but craving the sight of a familiar face anyway. She saw the empty room she was expecting, but it now had those thin vines running over the floor and stretching up over the furniture and walls. 

Thirteen managed to get the window open and climbed through it. She had expected it to be warmer inside, but the coolness wasn’t due to wind, and instead seemed to be radiating off every surface she touched. The red color that glowed in the sky was less prominent indoors, instead making everything appear maroon and shadowy. Thirteen stood in the middle of the living room, tears coming to her eyes, alone in a nightmare. 

She walked into the bathroom, and saw exactly how exhausted she was. She placed a charcoal-covered hand on the mirror and squinted at herself. The purple shadows under her eyes were darker than they'd ever been, and Thirteen was sure that it wasn’t just due to the dim red lighting. There were many cuts covering her face, and the flecks of dried blood that remained under her nose looked like tiny footprints leading into her chapped lips. She wiped her tears across her cheeks until they had mixed with the dust on her face.

She explored the empty house. Not knowing what to do next, and afraid to use her powers to warm herself up, she decided to give into her exhaustion and sleep. She opened the door to the guest room, and hesitated. After a moment, Thirteen abandoned the room, and instead went to Lucas’s room. She laid down on top of the bed. The curtains were closed, but Thirteen could still see that ominous red glow through the window. 

However exhausted she was, Thirteen couldn’t sleep. She just stared into the scarlet-tinted curtains, and cried. She couldn’t understand how a world that felt so violent could be so still. She wished to be back with her new family. The strange black mark on her arm was still painful, and her head was pounding as hard as her heart. Thirteen wished for a dream to make her forget that she was in this empty world, but when she finally fell asleep, she didn't dream.


	20. Blinking Lights

Will didn’t sleep that night. He was given the smaller couch, perpendicular to Mike’s, but he just laid there, fidgeting with his bracelets. Every time he started to drift off, a voice in his head would scream, “Wait! You’re going to miss something!”

It was just past midnight when something broke the stillness. Will had been watching out the window when something caught his eye. The little nightlight that was plugged in to the wall had started to flicker off and on. This was too familiar for Will. He sat up and stepped over Max and Steve’s sleeping bags, making his way over to the light. It flickered one more time, and then stayed on. Will tapped on it, but it stayed on, shining it’s weak, warm light.

Will decided that it was just a coincidence, and went back to the couch. As he laid there, he couldn’t help but wonder if his instincts were right. Could Thirteen be alive in the Upside Down? Will tried to shake the idea from his mind, but it held on. They had watched the local news all day, and there had been no mention of finding a body in the wreckage. Whatever had happened in that lab, Thirteen could have gone through the gate or been transported to the Upside Down somehow, just like he had 35 years ago.

Will stayed awake all night, staring at that nightlight and wondering if he should share this with the others. 

In the morning, Will watched the sunrise. He made a pot of coffee and sat on the couch watching the nightlight. The nightlight turned off, and his heart skipped a beat, but he soon realized that it was because of the daylight.

Once the group started to wake up, Will eagerly turned the lamp on, and began watching it. After a fruitless night of waiting for the nightlight to flicker again, he was sure that he was wrong. But the little bit of hope he had kept his eyes glued to the lamp.

The group moved into the kitchen to heat up their leftovers from the night before. Jonathan helped Lucas, who looked exhausted, into the kitchen. Nancy and Mike were the only ones to stay in the living room with Will.

“Mike, can you eat something?” Nancy asked gently. Mike still hadn’t spoken, and he clearly didn’t plan on it. But eventually, Nancy got him to his feet and he was given a seat at the table. Will was left alone in the living room with his delirious determination, which was now being fueled by coffee. He stared into the lamp and watched it flicker.

He sat up, nearly spilling his coffee.

“Thirteen?” he whispered. The lamp flickered again. Will set down his mug and placed his hands on the lampshade.

“C-can you hear me?” Will asked the lamp. It flickered several more times and Will felt a rush of excitement as his heartbeat sped up. He remembered communicating with his mother through the electricity. 

 

———

 

In 1983, Joyce Byers had claimed that Will was trapped in the lights. She knew that everyone thought she was crazy, but when Will was missing, Joyce could feel her heart telling her that he was alive. Like in a Sylvia Plath poem, her heart kept beating, keeping her steady and alive, directing her to her son like a compass. 

On November 7th, the Byers’s phone rang, and Joyce heard her son’s breathing. It could’ve been anyone, but her heart told her that it was Will. 

“It was probably just a prank call, somebody trying to scare you,” Hopper had said the next morning.

“No, Hopper, it was not a prank. It was him,” Joyce had insisted. “What, you think I’m… I’m making this up?”

“I’m not saying that you’re making it up. All I’m saying is it’s an emotional time for you-”

“And you think I don’t know my own son’s breathing?”

That night, when the replacement phone rang, Joyce was waiting. Her heart started beating faster, like an alarm telling her that her son was on the other end.

“Mom?” Will’s distorted voice had asked. But before Will could say another word, the line had cut out again, and Joyce could no longer hear her son’s shaky breathing. She crumpled onto the floor, throwing the broken phone in anger and sobbing. That’s when the lights started to flicker.

The hall lights led Joyce to Will’s room, where _Should I Stay Or Should I Go Now_ was blasting. With her heart pounding, Joyce had summoned all the courage she had and opened the door to Will’s room. Those flickering lights matched up with the beating of Joyce’s heart, and she knew her son was there.

The next day was when Joyce started talking to Will through the lights.

“Blink once for yes, twice for no.” Joyce had told the lights, which flashed once in return.

Even if she had no proof, Joyce knew it was her son speaking to her through the lights. Those blinking lights had proved her intuition true, and Joyce had set up her Ouija board wall. Joyce had been determined to find her son, even if nobody believed her.

 

———

 

Now, Will understood how his mother must have felt. He held the lampshade in his shaking hands, waiting and praying for the light to keep flickering. Tears were starting to fall from Will’s face as he tried to quickly think of what to do next.

“Blink once for yes, twice for no,” He said quickly, remembering how he communicated with his mother when he was the one stuck in the Upside Down. The lampshade stayed unlit in his hands, and Will scrambled to find a question to ask Thirteen.

“Are… Are you in the Upside Down?” Will asked the lamp, which remained still. After a few long seconds, the lightbulb grew bright, and Will breathed a shaky breath. She was alive, for now at least, but Will knew better than anyone that it was hard to survive in that place. Especially when there’s a monster hunting you.

“Can you get out?” Will asked quickly. The light blinked twice in response, and Will felt his heart drop. “The gate’s closed,” he breathed. How could they rescue Thirteen if they couldn’t get through the gate? 

“We’re going to get you out, okay? I don’t know how, but we’ll find a way,” Will told the lamp, trying to stay optimistic for Thirteen’s sake. During the week he was trapped in the Upside Down, he had relied on the hope that his mother’s words had given him. 

“Um, don’t stay in the same place for too long, try to stay hidden, and keep your mind busy,” he offered, thinking back to the few parts of that week he remembered. It was all fuzzy, just as it had been since 1984. After he was rescued, it was like some memories were blocked out of his mind. He knew what had happened, of course. But it had always felt more like it was the memory of what had happened being explained to him, not a memory of something he actually experienced firsthand.

After he had given his advice to Thirteen, he snapped back into reality. He bolted into the dining room, where most of the group was eating slowly and staring at their plates. Lucas and Mike had eaten the least, and both men were sitting in complete stillness, seemingly unaware of their surroundings. When Will appeared in the doorway, Jonathan was the only one to look up.

“Will?” he asked, reading the distressed look on Will’s face.

“It’s Thirteen— Thirteen’s alive,” he said quickly. Now all eyes were on Will, squinting and glaring at Will.

“What do you mean?” Dustin asked quietly, frowning at Will.

“It was the lights,” Will started. “My mom talked to me through the lights; that’s how she knew I was in the Upside Down,” he said, silently begging them to understand.

“The lights were blinking?” Steve asked, sharing a look with Max. 

“Yes, yes, the lights,” Will tried to explain. “I asked her, through the lamp, if she was in the Upside Down. One blink means yes, and two means no, and she blinked yes. Then I asked if there was a way out, and she said no. I think in the explosion, the gate must have been closed, and Thirteen was sent to the Upside Down.” Once he had finished, the whole table was sharing glances, until Mike stood up. He didn’t say a word, but walked briskly into the living room.

“This lamp?” he called to Will. Will and the rest of the group followed him into the room to find him staring at the dim lamp that had been flickering wildly just minutes ago. Will nodded his head and stood by Mike’s side, gazing into the lightbulb. Mike gingerly rested a single hand on the lampshade. 

“Thirteen?” He asked. There wasn’t a single flicker of response. Will shook his head, somehow embarrassed that he couldn’t prove that she had been there.

“Are you sure you saw it blinking? It might've just been the wiring, or an old bulb,” Max offered.

“I’m telling you, I talked to her. I know she’s there,” Will said strongly, hiding his disappointment. “I think when Thirteen was fighting Dr. Taylor, all that energy must have done something, like when El fought the demogorgon. El was transported to the Upside Down, and maybe the same thing happened to Thirteen. But she said there’s no way back, so that energy must have also closed the gate, sealing her inside.” Will fiddled with his bracelets, staring at the floor while he spoke.

“How do you know? How can you be sure?” Nancy asked skeptically.

“I _know_.” Will insisted, twisting his bracelets in circles around his left wrist. His heart was pounding and familiar waves of anxiety were rushing through his body.

“No, you don’t just _know_. How do you know? Where are you getting this idea, that their energy blew up the lab? _How do you know?_ ” Nancy was yelling now, frustrated and unsatisfied with Will’s answer. 

“Nance,” Jonathan warned.

But in Nancy’s mind, her niece was dead, and Will was just trying to pretend that she wasn’t. It reminded Nancy of the year after Barb died, when everyone had to pretend that Barb wasn’t dead. Along with that memory, anger bubbled up from out of nowhere, and Nancy found herself shaking with rage.

“Nancy, please believe me, I _know_ , like my mom knew I was alive,” Will pleaded, unable to find the words to convince her. His hands were shaking again, and he was fidgeting with his bracelets more furiously than ever, all while he refused to meet Nancy’s eye.

“The only people who could _know_ where someone is without seeing them are El and Thirteen. And unless you have powers like them-” Nancy started, but stopped when her eyes caught Will’s wrist, covered in bracelets. She looked back up at Will, who was now meeting her gaze. He looked at her guiltily, as if he was pleading with her to not say what she was clearly thinking. But in her anger, Nancy continued anyway.

“Why do you wear those bracelets? What are they hiding, a tattoo?”

The room was silent as they stared between Will, who looked horrified, and Nancy, who had crossed her arms smugly. It was ridiculous, right? Was Nancy really implying that Will could have a number tattoo matching El’s and Thirteen’s? Did she really think that Will could have powers?

But it almost made sense. Will _did_ seem to know a lot about what had happened. Lucas, who had remained silent, thought back to when he called Will to tell him about Thirteen. 

_She has powers, doesn’t she?_

Will had somehow known immediately that Mike and El’s daughter had powers, even before he knew about her name being Thirteen. It was also Will who had suggested using her powers to find Mike and El, the same way El had found him in the Upside Down. Was his intuition just a coincidence, or did this mean that Will was somehow clairvoyant? Were the bracelets on his left wrist hiding a number tattoo?

Mike had slumped onto Will’s seat on the couch, but he stared up at Will cautiously. If Will had powers this whole time, why hadn’t he said anything? Why hadn’t he tried to find El?

Will shut his eyes and took a deep breath. He then started untangling his bracelets, removing them one by one. He removed the last bracelet, a handmade black one made of embroidery floss, with a rainbow design on the center. He set the bracelet down alongside the others, and held his bare wrist to face his body. Then, he turned his arm, holding out his wrist to show Nancy. Nancy gasped, and immediately guilt flooded her body. On Will’s wrist there was no number tattoo, but instead there were self-harm scars. There were too many for Nancy to count, overlapping and reaching nearly four inches down Will’s forearm.

“Will, I am so sorry,” Nancy whispered, now horrified at what she’d said. 

“It’s okay,” he choked. “When El went missing, I guess I blamed myself. She was going to visit me on the day she went missing, but, um, she never showed up. And after everything she’s done for me, saving my life several times, I couldn’t help her. And I started to get really… depressed, I guess. I started hurting myself that fall. But in January, when I moved to Chicago, I stopped. I wore the bracelets to cover the scars, and so when I got nervous, or I wanted to do it again, I could just play with them instead. Jonathan and my mom were the only people I told.” He ran his thumb lightly over the scars, as though he hadn’t felt their smooth, bumpy texture in years. “If I seem to know everything about El and Thirteen’s powers, or how the Upside Down works, it’s because I’ve been obsessing about it my whole life. It’s like what happened follows me wherever I go, ” he said, still staring down at his wrist. “Like a scar.”

“Are you sure that you were talking to Thirteen? It wasn’t just the electricity?” Jonathan asked Will, trying to break the uncomfortable silence.

“I’m sure,” Will squeaked, hastily tying the bracelets around his wrist again.

“Then I believe you. Thirteen’s trapped in the Upside Down,” Jonathan said. The group nodded somberly in agreement. Mike was looking fearfully up at Lucas, who stared darkly back.


	21. The Basement

Thirteen jolted awake, immediately sitting upright in Lucas’s bed. When she blinked her eyes, she saw that the red from behind the curtains was the only color visible through the cool darkness, and pinkish grey spores floated through the air around her. 

Thirteen scrambled out of the bed, heart and head still pounding from the night before. She leaned weakly against the doorframe, peering into the hall. Thirteen wandered into the living room, and slumped down on the couch, wrapping her thin arms around her body in a fruitless attempt to warm herself up. Thirteen stared around the room, watching the floating spores reflect the dark colors of the red sky outside the window.

_Thirteen?_

She jumped up, looking frantically around the room for the source of the voice.

“Will?” she asked into the emptiness.

_Can you hear me?_

It was definitely Will’s voice, but he wasn’t there. Thirteen turned her attention to the unlit lamp, resting seemingly forgotten on the table. Lucas’s voice was in her head, and she repeated his words out loud, just to herself. 

“Will was able to talk to his mom, through the lights, which blinked when he was there.”

Thirteen reached a hand out to touch the nearby lamp, and jumped when electricity zapped her fingers. She looked from her fingertips to the lamp, wondering if she had made the lamp blink.

_Blink once for yes, twice for no._

Thirteen stared into the lamp, determined. She held her hand out, ready to signal to Will.

_Are you in the Upside Down?_

Thirteen remained still for a second, looking uneasily around her. Tears started to form in her eyes, blurring out the room, until red was all she saw. Thirteen blinked the tears out of her eyes and shoved her hand forward, letting the electricity zap her fingers again. After a few seconds of silence, Will’s voice was there again. 

_Can you get out?_

Thirteen let another tear fall down her cheek and thought back to the wreckage of Hawkins Lab. There had been no gate on the wall there, which meant she was trapped. Thirteen extended her shaky hand to touch the lamp twice, sadly telling Will that she might be stuck there for good.

_We’re going to get you out, okay? I don’t know how, but we’ll find a way._

Thirteen heard the fear in Will’s voice, and crumpled to the ground. She clutched her knees to her chest, and sobbed quietly.

_Um, don’t stay in the same place for too long, try to stay hidden, and keep your mind busy._

She waited for the voice to keep speaking, but Will wasn’t there anymore. Thirteen brushed the tears off her face and got to her feet.

“Don’t stay in the same place for too long,” she repeated. She was paranoid that contacting Will could attract the Mind Flayer, which meant that Lucas’s house wasn’t safe anymore. Thirteen unlocked the front door and walked outside, crossing her arms to keep warm. She walked briskly through Lucas’s neighborhood, as if she had a destination in mind. Feeling as if the Mind Flayer was right behind her, Thirteen began glancing over her shoulder as she walked. 

Thirteen made her way back to the town square in Hawkins. She began walking into various buildings, trying to keep herself busy, as Will suggested. She walked through Royal Furniture Co., the movie theater, and the chain clothing store where Melvald’s General Store used to be. Thirteen tried to imagine what these places looked like in the real world, where they wouldn’t be illuminated by red. 

After she had finished taking a lap through each store, she sat down on the curb. Her stomach growled, and she thought longingly about the delicious pancakes that Lucas had made for her. 

All of a sudden, the horizon started to darken, and a grey figure appeared from behind the clouds. Thirteen hopped to her feet, ready to run, but something stopped her. The Mind Flayer seemed to be beckoning her closer. She watched it stretch an arm out, as if it was pointing to something miles away. Thirteen remained still, cautious of the monster in front of her. It impatiently began to reach toward her, and Thirteen ran into the nearby hardware store. 

She hid in the back of the store, waiting for the Mind Flayer to burst into the building and kill her. Thirteen was hungry and exhausted, and wouldn’t have the energy to keep running. With no way back to her world, she might as well give in. But after several minutes, there was only stillness.

Thirteen peeked up from her hiding place behind the counter, and watched the Mind Flayer through the window. It was tracing its tornado-like fingers along the street, leaving in its wake a trail of the dark sludge that rested all around the Upside Down. Once the Mind Flayer’s massive arm had disappeared down the street, tracing its way towards something, Thirteen carefully left her hiding place. She approached the dark mud that the Mind Flayer had left, and nudged it with her foot. It stayed in place, but it wasn’t still. Instead, it was breathing in and out as if it was alive. The body of the Mind Flayer in the distance was busy tracing its arm through the streets of Hawkins, clearly trying to lead Thirteen somewhere.

After another moment of waiting, Thirteen decided to follow the trail. She walked next to the breathing sludge, careful not to step on it as if it was a small animal. The Mind Flayer led her down an unfamiliar road that ran through a neighborhood. Thirteen was following it for twenty minutes before she got to where the trail stopped. When she looked up, she was stopped at a court, with a few unfamiliar houses stretched around it. The Mind Flayer had vanished, and Thirteen was alone in the middle of the street. The end of the mud trail pointed towards one house, with white siding above the brick first floor. It had a large tree shading the left side of it, and a long driveway stretching down to the back of the house.

Thirteen walked up to the front of the house, cutting through the lawn. She opened the unlocked front door and stepped inside. It seemed to be a normal house. Thirteen looked around, wondering why the Mind Flayer had led her there. There was a simple dining room to her left, and a living room to her right. In front of her, there was a kitchen visible behind a staircase. After a lap around the first floor, Thirteen made her way up the stairs. She opened the doors to each room, but they just appeared to be simple bedrooms. One room had been made into a study, and another looked like it was just for storage. 

Back downstairs, Thirteen circled around the house again, now opening every closed door she could find. She opened one door to the dark garage, and another that was just a coat closet. But a third closed door revealed a set of stairs that led to a basement. Immediately after opening the door, Thirteen began to cough, as a foul smell filled the air. She pulled her shirt over her face and recovered from the horrible scent. Whatever was down there, it was surely what the Mind Flayer was leading her towards.

Thirteen began walking slowly down the stairs, eyes watering because of the smell. The basement appeared blue and dim, as it was free from the blood-red light that filled most of the Upside Down. Once Thirteen’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, she walked off of the last few steps. Still hiding her face in her shirt to block the smell, Thirteen glanced around the basement. There was a couch and coffee table, along with many shelves and posters on the paneled walls. Boxes were stacked everywhere, creating a maze for Thirteen as she paced around the room. Some movement to her right caught her attention, and she focused on what looked like a pile of blankets in the darkness. On closer inspection, it was a few blankets draped over a desk and nearby chair.

As Thirteen approached the blanket, the smell seemed to be getting stronger. She hesitated to pull back the curtain, afraid of what could be causing such a repulsive stench. Thirteen took a breath through her shirt and held it, as she reached her hand up to feel the blanket. As with everything in the Upside Down, the blanket seemed to emit bitter coldness. Thirteen grasped the blanket and pulled it back.

There, lying on a bed of pillows, was a body. The figure was wrapped in a tattered and bloodied dress, with tiny flowers on it. The woman had long hair that scraped her shoulders and a stain of dried blood on her cheek. Her eyes were closed and a glassy, clear gel seemed to cover her face, which was tinted green. Some sticky substance had attached itself to the body, stretching over her like spider webs. The woman wasn’t breathing, but she still appeared to be moving, as there were hundreds of tiny maggots wriggling around her body.

Long-dead and preserved by the cold, it was unmistakably the body of Eleven.


	22. Eleven

June 30, 2000 was just another day for El. Mike had gotten out of bed before El, and started making her breakfast, just like always. El followed him into the kitchen.

“What are you doing?” he laughed, “I was going to make you breakfast in bed!”

“You always make me breakfast in bed! I wanted to eat at the table today,” El replied. She slumped into a seat at the table, ready for her food. 

“I wish I could have Eggo’s,” she said.

“The doctor said no, El. You have to eat better for the baby,” Mike reminded her.

“I know, Mike,” she sighed, thinking about the delicious waffles she’d been dreaming of for nine months.

“So, when are you having this baby?” Mike asked her.

“My due date was two days ago,” she said. “I’m tired of being pregnant, and I’m so ready to meet this baby.”

“Me too,” Mike said. He scooped the scrambled eggs onto a plate and passed it to El, who quickly started eating. Mike joined her at the table, carrying his own plate of eggs and a cup of coffee. When they had finished eating, Mike got dressed and left for work.

“I’ll see you tonight, okay? And call me if anything happens with the baby,” Mike said, kissing El on the cheek.

“Okay, love you.”

“Love you too.”

Once Mike had left for work, El changed out of her pajamas, choosing a simple flowery dress to wear for the day. She grabbed her small purse and put her most comfortable pair of shoes on her swollen feet, ready to leave the house. 

Mike and El’s house was close to the town square, but still rested on the edge of the forest that surrounded Hawkins. The house was a small two-bedroom, but it had a wonderful large backyard that bordered the woods. As much as El liked the house, she had never liked staying in a small place for a long amount of time. Each day she would walk around town, looking for something to do and visiting her friends and family.

Today, she had plans to visit Will and Joyce, but she had some time to kill before she was supposed to be there. As El walked through the neighborhood, she decided that she would go to the bakery and find something to eat. El would stop by the police station to visit her dad, Chief Hopper, and Lucas, who had been working there for nearly three years. El had been hanging out around the police station ever since she was 14, helping the receptionist, Flo, and playing pranks on Officer Callahan. After visiting the police station, El would start walking towards the Byers’s house, ready to spend the afternoon with Will and Joyce, who both had Fridays off work.

But El had gotten halfway to the bakery before she stopped in her tracks. An intense pain hit her like a ton of bricks, and El dropped her purse on the sidewalk and clutched her stomach. After the pain had started to fade away, El’s heart started to pound.

“The baby’s coming,” she whispered to herself. She tried to grab her purse to call Mike on her new cell phone, but as soon as she knelt down the pain was back. El grunted in pain, and felt the ground start to rumble underneath her palms. El breathed through her pain, but she realized that what she’d been afraid of was happening.

Mike and El had planned to have the baby at home. They were afraid that if El went to a hospital, she could accidentally use her powers, potentially uncovering her secret powers to the town. If El went into labor while Mike was at work, she was supposed to call Mike to come get her. They would go home to have the baby, calling anyone who knew about El’s powers and could help.

But things were happening much quicker than El and Make anticipated. El realized that she was a few buildings down from the hospital, which was her only option. Even if she called Mike, they would never make it home in time.

El grabbed the strap of her purse and pushed to her feet. She shuffled quickly towards the hospital, holding on to her stomach and trying to ignore the blood starting to stain her dress. When El reached the hospital doors, she forced them open with her powers without thinking and rushed into the lobby.

As soon as she was in the building, a nurse was by her side.

“Having… A… Baby,” El grunted through another contraction.

“Get Dr. Taylor!” The nurse called to another worker, ushering El along.

In the next minute, El found herself laying down in a hospital bed with the world around her spinning. A doctor ran into the room, ordering the nurse to leave the room. The doctor had large glasses that hid her young face and long blonde hair that was pulled into a tight ponytail. Dr. Taylor looked hungrily at El, who was too preoccupied to notice the expression on her face. 

“Mike,” El moaned, trying to reach for her purse. But the doctor only pushed El’s purse further away. El forgot about her cell phone when the next contraction hit. 

The doctor in front of her was ordering El to push harder, and El let out a yell, pushing with all her might. A nearby cart rolled away from her as if it was pushed and crashed into the wall, sending metal tools skidding across the floor. El looked nervously at the capsized cart, with blood rushing from her nose. She raised a weak hand to wipe the blood across her face, and glanced at the doctor, wondering if her secret was out. But just for a second, the look on the doctor’s face seemed to be one of glee, not fear. 

Before El could think, she was in the middle of another contraction; one that was worse than all the others combined. El couldn’t stop herself from yelling again, and shut her eyes as hard as she could. She saw the shadows of the flickering lights through her eyelids and heard the furniture shift around her, as she pushed everything away with her powers. El continued to yell as she pushed, and after a while she started to tune out the world around her. El opened her eyes into a squint, she saw a rush of grey spin around her. An icy pang of fear struck her heart. Through the tornado of grey particles and the wildly flickering lights, El saw the doctor leaning against the wall, staring open-mouthed at the mass of grey surrounding her. El kept screaming and pushing, as the only thought in her mind was to get the baby out. _Save the baby, save the baby, save the baby._

Then, everything was dark.

When El opened her eyes again, she was coughing, spitting blood out of her mouth. She moaned in pain and couldn’t find the strength to move. Everything hurt, and she could hardly think straight.

_Save the baby…save…the baby._

El laid in the darkness for what felt like an eternity. She was more exhausted than she’d ever been, and kept her heavy eyes shut. Every time an image flashed into her mind of the dark, swirling particles, her body twitched in fear, and El could feel cracks of dried blood along her face. She had a dull pain that washed through her body like an ocean, moving slowly from her head to her legs, although the cold ground she was lying on numbed it like an icepack on a twisted ankle.

After hours had passed and El had drifted in and out of consciousness several times, she finally had the energy to sit up. El opened her eyes to see a familiar sick blue color on the ceiling. grey particles spun around the air with her breathing, like dandelion seeds in the spring breeze.

“No, no, no,” she whimpered, shutting her eyes tightly and praying that she was imagining things. 

“Mike?” El whispered, hoping she would open her eyes again and see his face instead. But she was still stuck in the middle of the dark blue world that mocked the town she knew, just as it always did.

El rolled onto her side, spitting more blood out of her mouth. She looked down at her stomach, now thinking about her baby. Her flowery dress had a large, brown bloodstain over her swollen stomach, but there was no baby. El sobbed. It was good that her baby was left in the real world, where Mike could take care of it, but she had never gotten to hold it. She didn’t know if it was a boy or a girl, and she hadn’t named it. 

El rolled onto her knees and elbows like she was praying, letting her head hang over the cold ground as she cried. When she sat up, she started to look around her. She was on the floor of a dark hospital room, with the all-too-familiar vines climbing over the floor and up the walls. 

El shivered. Even though it had been a hot June day, she wished she had grabbed a jacket before she left her house. El got to her feet and leaned, exhausted, against the wall. Her knees shook beneath her, and her whole body ached, but she stumbled forward. El slowly made her way back into the hospital lobby and out onto the street. Her mind was racing, wondering what monsters could be lurking in the shadows around her. 

As she walked, she was thinking about what the doctor would tell Mike. What would he name the baby? What would Mike tell Hopper? El walked down the street, not paying any attention to where she was going. She felt blood drip weakly down her body, and occasionally would let out a sob.

El let her legs carry her down the streets of Hawkins, staring at her feet as she walked. When she wasn’t looking at the dark world around her, she could almost pretend that it was winter, and the grey particles floating around her legs were just snow flurries. When the road ended, El stopped and looked up. She clutched her bleeding stomach and looked around her. She had unknowingly made her way to Mike’s old house. Over the roof of the house was the cloudy blue skies that always hovered over the Upside Down, but at the horizon there was a sliver of red. It looked like it was mimicking a sunset, but El knew that there was no sun in the Upside Down. 

A shadow behind her made her look over her shoulder. There, sitting among the blue and red clouds was the Mind Flayer. El whimpered, shrinking back. The Mind Flayer sat still in the sky, staring at her as if it was mocking her misfortune. El scrambled away from the Mind Flayer, into the Wheeler’s house, and it let her go. El being stuck in the Upside Down seemed to be enough revenge for the Mind Flayer.

Inside the house, El tried to breathe and calm herself down, but it hardly worked. She leaned against the closed door, hyperventilating and feeling more sick than she’d ever felt. El turned and threw up on the floor, then sobbed weakly into her hand. 

Once El had stood back up, she limped into the living room and watched the Mind Flayer out the window. It sat smugly in the distance, watching her right back. El shuffled into the kitchen, feeling herself grow weaker by the minute. She instinctively moved to the basement steps. She stepped slowly down the stairs, using the rail to support her. Karen Wheeler had lived alone in the house since she and Ted had gotten a divorce. Boxes of junk littered the floor, but the basement had remained untouched since Mike and this friends had stopped using it. El smiled when she saw that the blanket fort that Mike and El used to sit under was still set up. She thought back to her first night outside of Hawkins Lab, when she’d slept in this same blanket fort. She sank to her knees and crawled into the fort. She rested her head on the cold, yet comfortable pillow. El brushed her hair out of her face and laid her left hand down in front of her. She stared at her tattoo, strength fading quickly. She closed her eyes, still absentmindedly picturing the number on her wrist. That number was the last thought in El’s mind as she gave in to her pain.

_011._


	23. Bury The Past

Thirteen stared into the decayed face of her mother, afraid to move. She immediately recognized her from the photo Lucas had given her, but aside from her long hair and aged face, she more closely resembled the young girl from the video that Dr. Taylor had shown her. Her starved and sunken face matched the girl with the shaved head who could crush metal with her mind, not the happy woman wearing reindeer antlers and laughing with her friends. Her 011 tattoo was bold on her wrist.

Coughing from the smell, Thirteen backed away from El’s body. She let the blanket fall back into place, hiding her mother from view. Thirteen expected herself to cry, but no tears came. Instead, she sat back on the cold floor, staring at the blanket in front of her. Immediately, she doubted whether she had really seen her mother’s face. It couldn’t be real, perhaps just her tired mind playing tricks on her. But it wasn’t, and she knew it. Her mother was dead. After all this time, she’d been lying there dead. For eighteen years, Mike Wheeler drove himself crazy searching for his wife. For eighteen years, El’s friends and family had kept her in the back of their minds, waiting for her to come back into their lives. For eighteen years, Thirteen had imagined having a real family and risked her life trying to find her mother. But El was dead.

Hot rage swam inside her until she couldn’t control it. Thirteen jumped up, hearing only her heartbeat like a drum in her ears. She sprinted up the stairs and through the house, stomping on many of the thin vines that hugged the floor. She burst out of the house and stopped running midway through the lawn. She stood, clenching her fists and glared at the Mind Flayer in the sky. The monster looked down at her from its bed of red clouds, taunting her. 

Thirteen had misconstrued the Mind Flayer’s actions. She had believed that the monster had taken pity on her, leading her to safety instead of attacking her. But in bringing her to her mother’s body, the Mind Flayer was sending a message. Eleven had died there, stuck in the Upside Down with no way to get home, and Thirteen would too.

Thirteen screamed, shoving her arms in front of her, pointing at the grey monster in the sky. The dark ash on her palms blended neatly into the black scars on her right arm, as Thirteen felt blood mix with the sweat below her nose. She had never been so angry, and she felt her eyes burn with fury.

The tops of the trees below the Mind Flayer were burning quickly, as each bunch of leafs blazed in the wind. The Mind Flayer began to disappear into the growing cloud of smoke. A hissing pierced the air, harmonizing with Thirteen’s screams. 

The Mind Flayer had retreated, but Thirteen wasn’t finished. She made her way down the street, burning each ghost-like tree and creeping vine she passed. Thirteen’s screams had faded into a growl and she swung her arms around madly, igniting the heartless world around her. Blood dribbled down Thirteen’s chin and ash spread further up her arms, but she ignored her own fatigue in favor of sending the Upside Down up in flames.

Thirteen was running as fast as she could to Lucas’s house, desperate to hear Will’s voice again. Hot tears like boiling water raced down her face. She looked over her shoulder to see the cloud of smoke rising over Hawkins. The fires had already burnt out from the cold, but the smoke that darkened the sky and dimmed the glowing red light told her that she’d done some damage.

When she reached Lucas’s house, she flung herself through the front door and slammed it closed behind her. She closed her eyes and leaned against the back of the door, sinking onto the floor. Thirteen sobbed loudly into her arms, unable to think straight. 

 

———

 

“If she’s in the Upside Down, how do we get her out?” Dustin asked the group. They had been sitting in silence for some time, all staring at the unblinking lamp.

“I don’t know if we can,” Lucas said hoarsely. “The only people who could open the gate are El, who’s been missing for twenty years, and Thirteen, who’s been stuck in the Upside Down with no food or water and likely doesn’t have the strength to open the gate. Not to mention that we can’t really communicate with her, and who knows if she could even open a gate from the Upside Down to here. It’s only been done the other way around.” 

Mike heard the bitterness in Lucas’s voice. He felt bitter too. Hearing Lucas describe El and Thirteen like that made Mike’s heart pang. Mike got to his feet and started pacing back and forth, the way he always did when he needed to think.

“Mike, what’re you doing?” Nancy asked gently. Mike had hardly moved or spoken since they got back from the lab, but he seemed to be snapping back to his old self.

“What if we can communicate with her,” he said, still pacing.

“What?” Max asked.

“Will, didn’t your mom communicate with you through Christmas lights?” Mike asked. He stopped pacing and turned to face Will.

“Yeah, she painted the alphabet on the wall. When I pointed to a letter, a bulb would light up,” Will said.

“Right,” Mike said. “And we know you can still communicate with her through lights, even though the gate is closed.” He pointed at the lamp. Will noticed a look of determination back in Mike’s eyes.

“Thirteen can’t read though,” Nancy said. “We can’t do the alphabet.”

“No, but there was another way we heard Will in the Upside Down,” Mike explained, looking from Nancy to Dustin.

“The Heathkit ham radio!” Dustin exclaimed, standing up.

“The what?” Jonathan asked.

“When Will was in the Upside Down, El used her powers to channel Will’s voice through a radio,” Dustin explained. “It was this old radio we had at the middle school, for A.V. Club.”

“Does the middle school still have the radio?” Nancy asked.

“No. When El channeled Will’s voice she fried it,” Mike said.

“Great, so that doesn’t help us,” Steve muttered.

“Yes it does,” Mike insisted. “If we can get a powerful enough radio, we might be able to speak to Thirteen, or at least hear her. If we can communicate with her, we can get her out.”

“We have our police radios,” Steve offered, glancing at Lucas, who looked skeptical.

“No, we need something more powerful,” Mike said.

“I got it,” Nancy said. She had her laptop open in her lap, and was scrolling through a Google search page for ‘best ham radio 2018’.

“This one looks good,” Dustin said, pointing to a radio on her screen.

“Kenwood TS-590SG,” Nancy read aloud. “Where could we get one quick?”

“Mr. Clarke!” Will shouted. “He loved this kind of thing. Is he still in town?”

“Yeah,” Lucas sighed. 

“Then that’s our best bet,” Mike said. 

“I’ll call him,” Dustin offered. He found the number in his phone and hit ‘Call’, motioning for everyone to be quiet.

“Hello? Mr. Clarke? Hey, it’s Dustin Henderson. How have you been?”

Mike started pacing again. Everyone else was still, waiting for Dustin to get through the small talk and ask about the radio.

“Listen, I know it’s been a while, but I’m in town and I need a favor. I’m here with Lucas Sinclair, Max Mayfield and Will Byers, and we need to borrow a radio. It’s for… an experiment.”

Steve shook his head and Max raised her eyebrows. 

“Oh, yeah? That’s great, thank you. We were looking for something like a… Kenwood TS-590SG,” Dustin read off the laptop. “Oh, that’s alright. Yeah, I think that’ll work fine, thanks so much Mr. Clarke. We’ll be by to pick it up soon.”

Dustin hung up the phone and beamed at the group. “I got it,” he said happily.

“What kind?” Mike asked.

“Yaesu FTDX 1200,” Dustin said proudly. “Lucas, Max, and Will are supposed to come with me to pick it up though.”

“Why not me?” Mike asked, hurt.

“Mr. Clarke doesn’t know you’re back, and it wasn’t worth explaining.”

Mike looked angrily at Dustin for a moment, but let his anger fade. Dustin, Lucas, Max, and Will all jumped into Dustin’s car and set off towards Mr. Clarke’s house.

When they returned, Max carried in the radio. The former members of the Hawkins Middle A.V. Club all enthusiastically fumbled around with it, while Nancy, Jonathan, and Steve watched. Lucas produced Thirteen’s blindfold, rescued from the floor of the lab before it blew. He placed it on top of the radio, right by the microphone.

“This is a much better radio than the Heathkit. I doubt she’ll fry this one,” Dustin said.

“Let’s hope so. This thing was probably super expensive,” Max replied.

“Okay,” Mike said, interrupting their conversation. “What do you think, Will? Would she be able to see it in the Upside Down?”

“Yeah, I think so. I don’t know if she’ll know how to use it though.”

“If she says anything, we’ll hear it,” Mike said confidently.

“Let’s hope so,” Max repeated.

 

———

 

Some time passed, and the radio stayed silent. Every few minutes, Will would speak into the microphone in the hopes that Thirteen would hear him, but there hadn’t been a response yet. Mike was unable to remain still. He paced back and forth and took laps around the house. He turned all the lights on in every room, incase they would start to flicker.

The rest of the group stayed in the living room. Nancy did some work on her laptop to pass the time, Dustin read a book, and Steve and Max were both busy texting their wives. Jonathan and Will played card games, just like they used to when Joyce and Lonnie would fight and they wanted to distract themselves. Lucas watched them play, although his thoughts were on Thirteen and his eyes kept drifting over to the radio.

Then, the hall light flickered. Everyone looked up. Mike stopped pacing and stood open-mouthed, watching the light. The light flickered a few more times, every few minutes, but that was it. The group collectively assumed it was the wiring and went back to what they were doing in silence.

The hall light flickered again, and everyone glanced at it. And then another light flickered. They all sat forward. Then, the lamp blinked on and off. Nobody dared to breathe. Static sounded from the radio.

 

———

 

After an eternity, Thirteen had managed to stop her tears. She was staring blankly forward, curled up into a ball on the floor. There were still wet tears on her face, but she just laid there, unmoving.

Finally, she sat up. She moved into the living room like a ghost, heading for the couch. But she stopped in her tracks. There was something new in the room. An unfamiliar machine was sat in the middle of the coffee table. Thirteen’s mind immediately went to the machines that Dr. Taylor had used to do tests on her, and she ran to the corner of the room. Her heart was pounding, but the machine stayed still, only giving out a light crackling noise. 

Thirteen studied the machine. She noticed her blindfold resting on top of the machine, and approached it slowly. She picked the dark piece of fabric up and held it in her hands. It was cold, like everything in the Upside Down, but it felt good to hold it. 

She studied the machine, interested but cautious. This was Lucas’s house. It was safe here. Suddenly, Thirteen understood. They wanted her to find them, like in the bath! That’s why the blindfold was there, and this machine was just like the radio Lucas had used.

She eagerly put the blindfold on and tried to lose herself in the static. Quicker than ever before, Thirteen found her self alone in the dark void. She heard a crackling noise to her left. When she turned, she saw the familiar faces of her family, all crowded around the radio.

Thirteen ran over to them, smiling through her tears. She avoided touching them, remembering her first time in the void, when she had touched Mike’s shoulder and he turned into smoke. 

“Dad,” she whispered, looking at Mike. 

To her surprise, everyone seemed to hear her. Mike smiled at the radio, tears forming in his eyes. The group all breathed a sigh of relief and looked around at each other.

“Thirteen,” Mike said. “Are you okay?”

“I’m alive,” she said. 

“We’re going to get you out, okay? If we can talk to you, we can get you out,” Mike told her.

“Are you too weak to open another gate?” Max asked.

“I don’t know. I’m so tired and hungry, but I could try.”

“Save your energy until you’re ready, but don’t wait too long,” Will advised.

“Okay,” she replied, happy to hear his voice again, but even happier to see his face.

“What’s it like there?” Jonathan asked.

“It’s so cold, and dark. And the sky is all red, not blue.”

Will looked puzzled at this, but remembered the red storm clouds in the sky when he first saw the Mind Flayer.

“Thirteen?” Lucas asked. “I can’t wait to see you again. I really miss having you here, and I’m sorry about what happened.” He cringed at his own words, aware of how cheap and meaningless they sounded.

“I miss you too,” Thirteen’s small voice echoed in the void.

“Hey Thirteen?” Dustin asked next. “Why did the lab explode? What happened?”

Thirteen watched as the group all nodded their curiosity at his question. She waited another second before she answered.

“I don’t know. I was fighting Dr. Taylor when you left. We grabbed each other and we were using all the power we could. I was trying to burn her, and she was trying to freeze me. Then I woke up in the Upside Down. The lab was wrecked, and part of the ceiling fell. The gate was closed. I found Dr. Taylor’s body under the rocks. She’s dead.”

She watched the faces of her family. From their expressions, they clearly weren’t sure if they should be happy or sad about this news. But frankly, Thirteen wasn’t sure either.

“I’m sorry, Thirteen. But you’ll be out of there soon, okay? You’ll be home soon,” Mike said, smiling at the radio again. Thirteen smiled back. His smile reminded her of the picture from the Christmas party. She could almost imagine El right next to him. 

_Oh._ Suddenly, she felt like she got all the air knocked out of her again.

“I have to tell you something,” Thirteen said, dreading what she was about to say.

“What is it?” Mike asked. He had no idea what was coming. Thirteen hesitated.

“I-I saw the Mind Flayer. It led me to a house, and I went inside. I went down the stairs, and there was a blanket fort. And…” she trailed off, suppressing a sob. A sick feeling came over Mike and the rest of the group.

“Eleven’s gone,” Thirteen whispered.

The air was knocked out of everyone in the room.

“What?” Jonathan asked, sure he had misheard her.

“Gone,” she cried.

Time stood still.

“No,” Nancy whispered.

Jonathan and Will embraced each other, each sobbing onto the other’s shoulder, mourning their sister. This was how they had greeted each other the last time they were both in Hawkins. It had been Joyce’s funeral, in 2006. Jonathan had gotten a cab from the airport to the Byers’s old house, where Will had been waiting. Will ran outside and hugged Jonathan, and they had mourned their mother together. Now, the brothers were stuck grieving El together. Will thought about watching movies with El and Max. It was an unlikely trio, but the three of them became close in their late teens. Nearly every other Friday night, they would save up some money, go buy some junk food, then go back to Will’s house to watch movies. When Max had moved away, Will and El continued the tradition on their own, now free to watch all the cheesy movies they wanted without Max happily making fun of them. Jonathan remembered the day that El had come to the Byers’s house crying. It was 1986, when El and Mike had just broken up for a few years. El had come to Will for support, but Will had been with Mike and the Party, and Joyce was working late. But Jonathan had let El in anyway, and they had spent hours together, talking, listening to music, and eating desserts. When Hopper finally came to pick El up, Jonathan decided that they had gone from nearly strangers to friends.

Dustin buried his face in his hands. After all the years he spent unable to think about El, he now regretted that feeling. The memory of her saving Mike and him at the quarry, the memory of her making the van flip, the memory of her walking through the door after being missing for a year, and the memory of her and Mike’s wedding all flashed through his head.

Max rested her head against the wall, crying loudly. She had missed her best friend for twenty years now, and she always had hope that she’d come back. But now, what was she going to do? She had never wanted this kind of closure. Max remembered 1997, when a 26-year-old Max had been about to move back to California. On her last night in Hawkins, El had taken Max out to eat, and given her a going-away present: a framed picture of the Party and a small friendship bracelet, just like the ones Max and El used to make for each other when they were fifteen. Max had kept that bracelet in her pocket for the whole time she’d been back at Hawkins. She held it in both her hands and cried into it.

Steve held Nancy as she cried. Steve thought about the Summer of 1985, when El would come into his work, at an ice cream shop, and buy a chocolate ice cream cone. She would sit in her regular booth and eat it. When the store wasn’t super busy, El would use her powers to levitate his hat off his head, and he would snap at her. El and Steve would giggle together, and occasionally Steve would give her a free extra scoop of ice cream. Nancy thought about 1993, when El had made her the maid of honor at her wedding. Nancy had helped El plan the wedding, then wore a lovely lavender dress. At the reception, El had come up to Nancy. ‘We’re officially sisters now!’ El had told her, and the sisters had danced together. 

Mike had a look of horror on his face. This was his worst fear. He had searched for her for eighteen years, but she had been dead this whole time. Lucas stood up and went up to Mike’s side. Mike collapsed onto Lucas’s shoulder, feeling all the grief from the past eighteen years on his chest. Lucas and Mike were the most prone to fights within the party, but they were also like brothers. Lucas consoled Mike, while thinking about how badly he wanted El, Mike, and Thirteen to be together as a family. Lucas thought about how alone El must have felt, and how alone Thirteen must feel now

Unlike the others, Mike couldn’t think of one specific memory of El. Instead, he just pictured her face. Somehow, it was comforting to him that she had gone to the old blanket to die, as if he thought he had been imagining their love as stronger than it was. But El going to his old house to lie down in the blanket fort he had built, where she had slept safely for the first time and where a young Mike had given her the name ‘El’ told him everything he needed to know about her. He just couldn’t believe that she had died alone, without him there, and without knowing that he would’ve spend eighteen years or the rest of his life looking for her.

“I really thought she was still out there. I thought she was still alive,” Mike whispered through his tears.

“I know, man. I think we all did,” Lucas said dully through his tears.

From the void, Thirteen watched her family mourn. She stood helplessly, unable to comfort them. Without any memories of her mother to look back on, she was surrounded by friends but was still so isolated, as though she was worlds away. Her own sobs were echoed through the radio.


	24. The Compass

Thirteen couldn’t resist the impulse and reached out to touch Mike and Lucas. Knowing what would happen, she whispered a small ‘goodbye’. She watched her family turn into smoke, leaving her in the limitless darkness. With the connection broken, she was left as alone as she felt. She tore her blindfold off and hugged it to her chest. Tears rested under her eyes as Thirteen knelt in front of the radio, silently sobbing. She wasn’t sure why, but watching her mother’s family grieve in a way she never could made her furious. It wasn’t fair, that she’d never get to know El. For someone who was so beloved and important to her friends, Thirteen felt an emptiness in her heart when she thought about her mother. It was like the ghost of a relationship. Someone she’d always wanted to know, but she was stuck imagining what it was like. Eleven saved her friends and her friends saved her, but to her own daughter, she was essentially a stranger. 

Thirteen fell asleep on the couch that night, afraid to leave the safety of the radio. She put her blindfold on to block out the red light that illuminated the room. Her head felt heavy after having cried so much. Thirteen traced her fingers over her tattoo. She pictured the _011_ on her mother’s skin. She whispered to herself, as if her mother could hear her.

“Mom,” her voice squeaked. “I’m sorry you’ve been alone so long. I’m sorry nobody came to find you. But nobody stopped thinking about you. Dad never quit looking for you, and everyone you loved cared about you so much. I do too. I’m so sad that you and I never got to meet. I wish I could’ve grown up with you. I could’ve had a name, and friends, and we could’ve been a family. I’m sorry that’ll never happen.” She sniffled. Cold tears soaked into the inside of her blindfold.

“I wish I knew you better. Everyone says how similar we are, but I don’t know. Are our powers and our names and our eyes all we have in common?”

With that, Thirteen started to fall asleep. 

 

———

 

In Lucas’s house, the group fell asleep quickly. They all had cried together, and now they each needed to be in their own worlds. Max, Dustin, and Steve had looked through all the pictures of El on Max’s phone. Mike and Nancy had had a little heart-to-heart in the guest room. Lucas, Jonathan, and Will had poured some wine and toasted to El in the kitchen. Now, they all had turned the lights off, and kept only the radio on as a white noise machine. The group had fallen asleep the night before thinking Thirteen was dead, but now they knew that El was gone for good. With the roller coaster of the day over, the group was eager to sleep and get their minds off of it.

In the morning, everyone was as exhausted as the night before. Jonathan was the first to wake up. He had a moment where he woke up to sunlight flowing into the room, and it felt just like every other morning. And then he thought _El is dead._ And he rolled over and buried his head under his pillow. As they woke up, nearly everyone in the group had a moment like that. In fact, the need to save Thirteen from the Upside Down was the only thing that got them to get out of bed.

The radio’s static suddenly started crackling louder. Everyone sat up, and Lucas and Max ran into the room from the kitchen.

“Hello?” Thirteen’s voice asked weakly from the radio.

“Hey Thirteen,” the group called back. Jonathan and Max shared a glance. They were both suddenly aware that nobody had comforted Thirteen the night before.

“How are you doing?” Max called, eager to make up for last night.

“Okay,” the voice replied.

“Are you ready to come home today?” Steve asked.

“Yeah, are you strong enough to open the gate?” Nancy added.

“I can try.” Thirteen’s voice said through the static, though her doubt wasn't lost.

“The lab’s nearly burned down. And they’ll probably have people there investigating why it blew up or something,” said Max.

“That might be the only place in Hawkins we could do it though. It’s not like we could open a portal to another dimension in a Starbucks,” Dustin argued. 

“We’ll try the lab. If we can’t do it, we’ll open the damn gate here if we need to. It doesn’t matter, as long as we get her out.” Lucas spoke sharply. Nancy nodded her agreement.

Thirteen’s voice interrupted their little moment of solidarity. “I don’t know if I can do it. I don’t know how.”

“What do you mean?” Mike asked. He had a look of worry on his tired face. Mike had been up all night thinking about his wife and daughter. At this point, the one thing he knew was that he was desperate not to lose another member of his family in that world.

“When I opened it the first time, I touched the monster in the void. This time, that won’t work,” Thirteen’s voice explained slowly.

“What if you touched one of us? Could that work?” Steve asked.

“No, you just turn to smoke and I can’t see you anymore. I tried last night.”

The group was silent. Nobody knew what to say. Even Will, who had the most understanding of the Upside Down, wasn’t sure what to tell Thirteen.

The silence lasted several minutes. Max and Nancy had clasped hands, losing hope. 

“If I die here,” Thirteen started, but trailed off. The group winced at her words. They weighed the possibility of losing Thirteen the same way they had lost El. Thirteen’s sobs rang through the radio again.

“You won’t,” Nancy insisted, though she wasn’t convinced.

“Yes. I will,” Thirteen cried, louder than anyone anticipated. “I will.”

“Thirteen, come on,” Lucas pleaded.

“No, I can’t do it. I’ll just let you down. I can’t do it. I’m sorry,” Thirteen’s voice was crying out, despite the group’s efforts to calm her down.

 

———

 

Thirteen’s sobs were growing louder and the lights in Lucas’s house flickered madly. Thirteen watched from the void as the group all looked horrified, almost nauseated at the radio. They didn’t— _couldn’t_ understand how she felt. They looked at one another like they were in a restaurant and a nearby table had a crying baby that wouldn’t be quiet. Thirteen’s fear had turned to anger. Anger at her family, anger at herself, and anger at the Mind Flayer.

Alienated yet again, Thirteen let out a wail that quickly rose into a scream.

 

———

 

The radio exploded. Sparks flew in every direction and sharp yellow flames lit up the room.

“Shit!” Dustin roared, jumping to his feet. Max moved quickly, unplugging the radio from the wall before scrambling away from the fire.

“Do you have a fire extinguisher?” Jonathan shouted to Lucas.

“What?” Lucas shouted back, unable to hear over the squeals of everyone trying to get out of the smoky room.

“Fire extinguisher!” Nancy snapped at him, hauling her bag away from the flames.

“Oh, no, I don’t have one!” Lucas yelled.

“I’ll get water!” Steve shouted, running into the kitchen.

“No! It’s an electrical fire, you smother it with a blanket or pour baking soda on it!” Dustin yelled. 

Will grabbed the closest blanket off the couch, a quilt that Lucas’s grandmother had made for him.

“No!” Lucas yelled, but it was too late. Will and Nancy were already patting the fire out and his blanket was a casualty.

Smoke filled the room as Mike and Jonathan set to work opened the windows, both coughing. The smoke alarm in the hallway kept beeping, unaware that the danger had passed. Nancy flipped the blanket onto Lucas’s carpet, spreading another cloud of ash and smoke through the room. Steve ran back into the room and dumped baking soda on the radio for good measure.

“How’d you know to do that, Dustin?” Jonathan asked.

“I’m a chemistry teacher,” he responded simply.

They examined the radio. It was covered in ash, and now baking soda, and the plastic had melted.

“Oh, God,” Dustin cried out suddenly, covering his face with his hands.

“What?” Mike asked, wondering how things could get any worse.

“Mr. Clarke. He’s gonna kill me.”

“He’s definitely not going to lend us another radio,” Max observed, as a few last sparks rained from the radio.

“What do we do now? About Thirteen, not Mr. Clarke,” Will said, snapping at Dustin, who had started to make some comment about pooling their money to pay Mr. Clarke back.

“If she does open the gate, we’ll know about it,” Mike remarked, looking sadly at the radio.

“How?” Steve asked.

“The gate affects the magnetic field. If the gate’s opened, all we’ll need is a compass, and it’ll lead us straight to it,” Lucas explained.

“So what do we do until then?” Nancy asked.

“Nothing. There’s nothing we can do, unless we could get another radio somehow,” said Will.

“That’s out of the question,” Steve told him, fanning smoke away from his face.

Dustin, Max, Will, and Lucas took the busted radio back to Mr. Clarke’s house, ready to blame it on bad wiring. Nancy stood on a chair to get the batteries out of the persistent smoke alarm, while Steve, Mike, and Jonathan dug through the boxes in the guest room, searching for a compass. 

“Found one,” Jonathan called from behind a tower of cardboard. He resurfaced, showing off a shiny, metal compass, just as Dustin, Lucas, and Max got back to the house.

“Was he mad?” Mike asked, concerned. The group had gathered back together in Lucas’s living room, crowded around the coffee table, which now housed one small compass.

“Yeah, I think he was disappointed, but he’s too nice to say anything. We tried to pay him back for it, but he wouldn’t take anything,” Will explained.

“Okay, what do we do with this?” Steve asked, gesturing towards the compass, lying still on the table.

“Here,” Dustin started, pulling his phone out and opening his compass app. The little red needle icon moved towards the back of Lucas’s house, pointing to the same direction as the other compass. “My compass app is set to point to true north. So it will always point in that direction.” He pointing north, mimicking the compasses. 

“And the other compass will point to true north too, unless there’s something else affecting the magnetic field,” Mike explained.

“Exactly,” Dustin said. “So if the compass changes directions, but my app doesn’t, we’ll know that there’s a gate open, interrupting the magnetic field. Then, all we have to do is follow the compass, and it’ll lead us straight to Thirteen.”

“What if she opens the gate, but she opens it directly north of us?” Steve asked.

“That’s pretty unlikely. Lucas’s house is right along the north edge of Hawkins. If she opens it in Hawkins, which she will, it’ll be somewhere south of here,” Nancy told him.

With that, the group settled down. They crowded along the sofas as they had gotten in the habit of doing for the past week. They went from checking the compasses every fifteen seconds to glancing at them every few minutes. The group got comfortable, watching television and catching up on work. The compasses remained still, signaling true north.


	25. Burn It Down

Thirteen’s scream sent her back into the Upside Down. She was angry and overwhelmed, and now she was alone yet again. She had watched the radio start to spark as she screamed, and she knew what she was doing, but she didn’t care. She ripped her blindfold off and let her yells continue. She threw herself onto the floor and pounded her fists agains the cold ground. 

Once she sat up, she brushed her tears away and glared at the radio. Thirteen took a deep breath, shuddering a little. She still wasn’t used to the bitter chill of the Upside Down’s air filling her lungs. She gathered her blindfold back up from the floor, and wrapped it over her eyes. But she was alone, permanently. She couldn’t get back into the void, no matter how much she tried.

In another burst of anger, Thirteen tore off the blindfold and clenched her fists. God, she was angry. She was going to die here, probably soon, and the Mind Flayer would get its way again. Thirteen’s thoughts shifted back to her mother.

Eleven had been targeted by the Mind Flayer, all because she closed the gate thirty years ago. Her poor mother had suffered so much in her life, and now she was left cold and rotting in a nightmare world. It wasn’t fair. Thirteen hated the people that hurt her mother. Thinking about the people at the lab hurting her, and all those other people, made her shake with anger. She wanted to burn that lab to the ground.

Now there’s an idea. One last taste of revenge. Sure, she had singed it when she had caused the explosion, but that wasn’t enough. Thirteen wanted it gone, or at least in this world. It wasn’t fair that Eleven was lying dead in a basement while the building that killed her still stood.

She made her way quickly through the dark streets of Hawkins, leaving a cloud of smoke in her wake. Thirteen knew where she was going, and kept the image of her mother’s face in her mind as she walked. As she walked, her anger only increased. The buildings grew sparse and Thirteen remembered the last times she’d traveled past the woods. 

Finally, she’d arrived in front of Hawkins Lab. She pushed her way through the chain-link fence, leaving a mark of ash where she’d touched the steel. Thirteen stopped walking and angrily examined the lab. The building didn’t look as harsh and menacing as when El had been kept there, but it was still towering and haunted. Brown and black streaks ran up the walls of the lab where it had been burnt, and broken glass was already laced in with the vines that scattered the pavement. It didn’t look as though the lab had burned down the day before, but rather that it had burned down years ago, and nature had taken it over. Vines raced out of broken windows and held tightly onto the old building.

Thirteen imagined all the horrible things they must have done inside that building. They hurt her mother and her grandmother, and many more people.

Thirteen was sure that if she burnt it down, the lab would remain the same as it was in the real Hawkins, but it would mean a lot to her to at least destroy this version of it. She raised her arms, facing her ash-covered palms to face the building. Heat and anger flooded her body again, and the image of El’s face burned in her mind again, but Thirteen hesitated.

This lab had hurt Dr. Taylor too, and now her body was lying in its basement among the rubble. Thirteen dropped her arms back to her sides, fighting with herself. Dr. Taylor had been a bad person, and Thirteen could have lived a happy life with her family if it weren’t for her, but Thirteen still didn’t want to leave her there. 

She ran her hands through her hair, dusting charcoal along her scalp, and sighed. She took a deep breath, letting as much of her anger fade away as she could. She wiped her face on her shirt, cleaning the sweat off of her acne-covered forehead and mopping up the ashes that stained her face. Thirteen moved closer to the building, searching for the opening she’d climbed out of the day before. Once she’d found it, she peeked inside. With her body blocking the only opening, the basement was dark. A few slivers of red light peered in from behind her, illuminating bits of the rubble. Thirteen took another breath, and started climbing down.

Once back inside the basement, Thirteen’s eyes adjusted to the darkness. The body of Dr. Taylor was lying, half-uncovered, in the rubble where Thirteen had left her. The body had begun to smell, similar to the smell that covered the basement where El had died. 

Thirteen took off her the jacket that Nancy had given her. She tied the jacket around her neck, letting it fall off her shoulders like a cape. Next, she put the collar of her ash-stained shirt over her nose, glaring at the body. She attempted to lift up the body. Luckily for Thirteen, she was taller than Dr. Taylor, and deceptively strong. On her second try, she hoisted Dr. Taylor over her shoulder, coughing from the smell as her t-shirt fell back under her nose.

Climbing out of the basement was a harder task than Thirteen imagined. With her captor draped over her right shoulder, she tried to climb up the wall. The gritty stone of the wall was hard to grip, and Thirteen kept scratching her hands. Her fingernails scraped over the rough surface of the cement, causing a sound that made Thirteen shudder. After getting a few feet up the wall, Thirteen would run out of strength and have to jump back onto the ground. Her third try was the most successful, but she only got a third of the way up the wall. 

She left the body slumped over on the floor as she rested. Thirteen sat on the pile of rubble, wishing she was at home with her new family. She laid back on the debris, expecting it to collapse under her weight. But it stayed still. Thirteen sat back up, looking at the pile of rubble behind her. It was a small pile of broken cement, wood, and wire, leaning up the wall towards the collapsing ceiling. She began climbing up the rubble, letting a few rocks fall to the base of the debris. Once she had reached the top, she was just over halfway up the wall. From atop the pile, she looked out over the room. Various piles of rocks and debris littered the floor, fallen from the crooked ceiling. 

Thirteen skidded down the pile and moved Dr. Taylor away from the hole in the ceiling. She set to work, moving the rubble closer to the hole. As she continued moving the pieces of cement to the base of the wall,her new pile was slowly reaching closer to the opening. It was hard work, and Thirteen tried her best to ignore her growling stomach as she moved the debris. After nearly an hour’s worth of work, the pile had almost completely been moved over to the opening. Thirteen had started adding rubble from the floor to the pile, adding a few more feet to its height. Dust clouded around the room as Thirteen moved the debris, sticking in her lungs and stinging her eyes. 

Once the pile was tall enough. Thirteen climbed to the top. The pile wasn’t as sturdy as she hoped, but it held up. The opening was just over her head, but she thought she was close enough. Back at the base of her tower, she swung Dr. Taylor over her shoulder again. They climbed the pile together, letting a trail of rocks fall behind them. Once at the top of the pile, Thirteen grabbed the limp body and began to hoist it over her head, pushing it roughly towards the gap in the ceiling. She was now unable to control her weakness, and her arms buckled under the weight of the body. Miraculously, as her arms collapsed and her feet slid further down the pile, the corpse didn’t fall with them. She had managed to get the body through the opening, and breathed a sigh of relief, feeling the aches in her arms along with her hunger pangs. 

Thirteen pushed the body through the gap, and then used the rest of her strength to pull herself up and out of the basement. Once out of the lab for what she hoped was the last time, Thirteen got to her feet weakly. She watched the dead body at her feet with disgust as it laid in the grass, its body as still as a statue. 

“Now what?” Thirteen asked the body. Dr. Taylor stayed still in response. Thirteen knew that people buried dead bodies, and looked around for something she could use as a shovel. She grabbed a thin slab of cement that had fallen from the building, and dug it into the ground to test it. The earth- if you could call it that- was softer than she expected. Despite the chilling air of the Upside Down, the ground wasn’t icy. It had the texture of soil after it rained, soggy yet dense.

Thirteen walked with her cement slab to the edge of the lab’s property, right near the fence. She found a spot near a large tree and started digging. Despite every muscle in her body aching for rest or food, she kept working. She didn’t feel right leaving Dr. Taylor dead in the basement or on the ground. All she wanted, aside from going home, was to burn that lab to the ground, but she couldn’t let her captor burn with it. Thirteen fought with herself again while she dug. Why was this voice inside her head making her feel compassion for the woman who had kept her prisoner for her whole life? How could she want to burn the lab down because it had hurt people, but not want the same fate for Dr. Taylor, who had hurt her?

After the grave had been dug, Thirteen clambered out, feeling more weak than before. She walked back to the lab and lifted the body back over her shoulder. Thirteen dropped Dr. Taylor into the grave, hearing a quiet _whump_ as her heavy body hit the soft ground. Thirteen stared into the grave, feeling her little compassion for her captor fade away. She took a last contemptuous look at the face that had imprisoned her for her whole life and began kicking dirt over the corpse.

After Dr. Taylor was hidden from view and dirt had covered the body, Thirteen dropped the piece of cement she had used as a shovel over the grave. She walked back to the lab and grabbed a piece of charcoal from the fire. On the cement slab, Thirteen wrote one of the few things she knew how to write, the number _12_. When her work was finished, she glared down at the number. She spat onto the cement slab and walked away.

Back at the front of the lab, Thirteen felt herself impulsively flush with anger, reacting to purely the sight of the lab. Thirteen raised her arms again, ready this time. Emotions rushed through her arms with her blood. Anger, sadness, and grief fueled her, and gave her the energy that she needed. After one final moment of peace, Thirteen let out a blood-curdling scream and let the lab go up in flames.

Hissing surrounded the still air around her as the fire burned. The orange flames grew like ivy up to the scarlet heavens, which moved aside to make way for the chain of dark smoke. Time stood still for Thirteen, as she held her shaking hands steady, keeping the pressure on the building. The world screamed back at her, burning and melting in response to the fire. The spores that regularly floated through the Upside Down were mixing with the red sparks that rose above the flames. The vines that previously littered the walls of the lab were spinning madly around as if they were alive, and furious to be used as kindling.

Thirteen pressed forward as the earth beneath her feet seemed to be trying to push her away. She pictured the face of her mother and let the world melt away in front of her. She didn’t feel the blood stream down her cheek or the sweat drip from her hair. 

She was unstoppable. Winds picked up around her, piercing her eyes like talons, but she didn’t care. She took another step forward, letting her life flash through her mind. The times her hair was shaved off. The times she was hooked up to the machines and tortured. The time she was burnt by the hot iron. The times she was handcuffed to her bed. The times she set fires against her will. The times she escaped. The time she killed her captor. The time she found her mother, dead.

The lab collapsed. Steel buckled under the weight of the building as smoke gushed out of the empty windows. Thirteen heard the horrible shrieks of the building as it fell, snapping her out of her concentration. She stumbled back across the rumbling ground, as white smoke flooded the air around her until she couldn’t see her feet anymore. Thirteen blindly ran through the fog, stretching her arms in front of her to feel for the fence. She was overcome with a strange sense of joy, and though she was fighting for breath, she almost laughed. She felt as light as a bird, and leaped through the air as she ran. 

She felt the steel fence in front of her and fumbled for the opening. She found it and burst through, nearly out of breath. She ran down the road, seeing the smoke start to thin out. Above her, a dusty mauve-colored smoke fumed, and thin tree branches were barely visible again.

Finally, Thirteen was able to breath again. She sank to her knees and clutched her chest, coughing. Her coughs turned into a laugh. She jumped back to her feet, and spun around, free from any feeling of exhaustion or hunger. 

Thirteen walked through the streets, looking for the Mind Flayer. The lab was gone, and now it was the monster’s turn. She let the sweat on her forehead sit, and kept her emotions in her chest. She walked back into Hawkins quickly, anxious to not let her anger or adrenaline fade.

As she walked, two images stuck in her mind every time she closed her eyes. There was the face of her mother, eighteen years dead and lying alone in another world, and the face of Dr. Taylor, killed by the powers she craved and buried by the girl she had tortured and held captive. What a messed up world. Thirteen thought about burying her mother in the same way she’d buried Dr. Taylor, but nicer. But El had looked comfortable lying in the blanket fort, and Thirteen decided to leave her be. Vengeance was the best gift she could give her mother, and she was halfway there.


	26. The Dream

The Mind Flayer seemed to know what Thirteen was thinking. It had reappeared in the sky over Hawkins, bowing its head down like a martial artist before a fight. Thirteen weaved through the town, growing closer and closer to the head of the monster.

The monster’s head was perched in the air over a building that Thirteen didn’t recognize. She was cautious of this, as the last time the Mind Flayer had led her somewhere, it was to the corpse of her mother.

Thirteen stood fifty feet from the enormous swirling head of the monster. The red clouds that framed it were dark and stormy, and a peculiar wind blew through the Upside Down, shaking the trees and pushing Thirteen’s greasy hair back. 

“No more,” Thirteen shouted up to the monster. “It’s over.”

She raised her arms, glaring dangerously at the monster. She stood still, and the Mind Flayer was motionless too, with its swirling particles the only thing moving between the two. Thirteen was shaking now, though she was trying her best to gather as much power as she could. 

An image flashed in her mind, like déjà vu, as if she had been in this same place before. What she saw was a single flower, set on top of a charred log. She was trying to burn it, but it sat still and cold in the fireplace. She was shaking, with her palms out in front of her, focusing with all her might. But still, nothing happened. 

She was afraid. Afraid of the pain that she had been through in order to use her powers. It wasn’t until she pictured Dr. Taylor’s face in the place of the flower that beads of sweat started to appear on her forehead.

Thirteen didn’t want to end up like Dr. Taylor, which is why it was so painful to imagine hurting her. But the feeling of burning Dr. Taylor, and of stabbing her with the broken glass was unlike anything else she’d ever felt. It was like the feeling of running through the forest, free for the first time in her life. But it was better. The best feeling that Thirteen had ever felt was hurting the person she hated, and that made her sick to her stomach. 

Was she no better than Dr. Taylor? Was she becoming a victim-turned-abuser just like her captor? Thirteen was ashamed of herself. She was afraid of her own violence, and it made her hesitant to use her powers.

So she stood there, in the house of a man who knew her parents, fighting with herself. She tried to burn the flower without it, but it was no use. Reluctantly, Thirteen let herself think about her dream.

 

———

 

It was a recurring dream, something she had been dreaming since she was ten years old. It had been seven months since Dr. Taylor had shaved her head, gave her the tattoo, and started hooking her up to the machines. She had started hurting Thirteen, though Thirteen didn’t understand what she wanted. All she knew was that the woman who had raised her, fed her, read her stories, and taught her the numbers was now hurting her every day, for no reason. But one night, Thirteen had a nightmare. She had been getting nightmares for months, but this one was different. There was no boogeyman or monster after her. In the dream, Thirteen was standing in her room, brandishing the cattle prod that Dr. Taylor had used against her. Dr. Taylor was on the floor below Thirteen. She was crying, and stumbling backwards to get away from Thirteen. But Thirteen stepped forward and aimed the cattle prod at her, shocking her the same way Dr. Taylor shocked Thirteen in real life. 

Thirteen had woken up from the dream, sweating and barely able to breathe. The thought of hurting someone else was foreign to her, but she couldn’t deny that it felt good to not be on the receiving end of the cattle prod. The dream kept coming back, sometimes with a few details changed, a couple times a week. Each time she woke up, Thirteen was soaked in sweat and panick.

Nine months into Dr. Taylor’s tests and two months into the nightmares, Thirteen used her powers for the first time. Dr. Taylor had placed a bag of chips in front of Thirteen, and told her to focus on it. Thirteen tried, but nothing was happening, just like every day. Her eyes kept flicking over to the cattle prod in Dr. Taylor’s hand, and Thirteen started thinking about the dream. 

Her eyes bore into the bag, and the mental image of the cattle prod in her hands ignited a feeling of anger in her chest. Sweat pooled on her head, but it didn’t distract Thirteen. She wanted to hurt Dr. Taylor. She saw Dr. Taylor’s face reflected in the plastic and felt her arms start to itch. God, she wanted to reach out and crush the bag, and let the image of her captor distort with the plastic as the chips crunched. Thirteen was shaking now, angry and hot. Finally, she couldn’t resist, and shot her itching arms up to the bag. 

Thirteen’s body lurched forward, and there was a sudden _pop_ that startled her. The bag burst into flames before her eyes. The twisted reflection of Dr. Taylor’s face melted and burnt in front of her. Thirteen watched the fire burn in shock, keeping her arms extended in front of her. Her eyes moved to Dr. Taylor, who had a grim smile on her face.

“You did it!” Dr. Taylor shouted, letting the cattle prod fall from her hand. Thirteen felt a tingling feeling under her nose, and for the first time noticed how weak she felt. She leaned back against the wall, dropping her arms to her side. She reached up to touch her nose, then looked at her hand. There was a perfect drop of blood on her finger. A dark ash covered her palm, juxtaposing the pale skin that peeked out from under her blackened fingerprints.

 

———

 

When Thirteen thought about that dream, she grew angry, but also sickly satisfied, like a child with chicken pox who kept itching their skin. It was the one thing that would, without a doubt, let Thirteen use her powers. Thirteen didn’t like that side of herself, but sometimes she had to use it. It’s what she was thinking about when she set fire to the flower, when she opened the gate, and when she fought Dr. Taylor.

It wasn’t until she saw her mother’s body when she was able to use something else other than violence. The image of her face was something that burned into Thirteen’s mind, making her feel that anger and sickness that allowed her to set fires. That grief was what Thirteen thought about when she burned the lab down. She didn’t need her dream.

But now, Thirteen was facing the Mind Flayer, ready to get her revenge like she did with the lab. She desperately wanted to watch it burn too, but she couldn’t do it. The image of Eleven’s face in her mind wasn’t enough anymore. But Thirteen couldn’t give up, and she couldn’t resort to the dream. She wanted her grief to be enough, but it simply wasn’t.

Thirteen let her arms fall to her side. She stared up at the Mind Flayer and it seemed to be staring right back. The two sat in stillness, each waiting for the other to make a move.

Thirteen’s mind was racing. She didn’t want to be like the monster in front of her, or like Dr. Taylor. She didn’t want to be evil. She _wasn’t_ evil. Thirteen had opened the gate to save her mother, even though she was terrified of it. She had let Dr. Taylor lunge at her in order to get the others out of the lab. She had buried Dr. Taylor when she could’ve just let her burn with the lab. 

Thirteen had what Dr. Taylor, the people from the lab, and the Mind Flayer never had: compassion, morals, and love.

“Dr. Taylor was evil, and the lab was too. And you’re evil,” Thirteen yelled to the monster, still hovering over the building. 

“Dr. Taylor is dead. The lab is gone. You’ll be gone soon too,” she continued, thinking out loud. The Mind Flayer didn’t flinch at her words, but instead seemed to be staring harder at the girl. Thirteen took a breath and looked down to the ground.

“I’m not evil,” she said. “I was raised in the middle of a lot of evil, but that doesn’t make me evil. When I was born, you took my mother from me, right? Then I was raised by an evil woman who never bothered to give me a name. When I was old enough, she brought in all the equipment from the lab and started hurting me.

“But that doesn’t mean I have to be evil, or violent. None of what happened to me was my fault. And even though I’m angry at Dr. Taylor, I would never hurt her like she hurt me. I would never.”

When she finished talking, she looked up to the monster. Cool winds hit her eyes again and she began to tear up. 

Thirteen felt free. It was like she was telling the devil on her shoulder that she wasn’t going to listen to it anymore. 

“I’m going to kill you,” she told the monster. “Not because I’m violent and evil, but because you are.”

She raised her arms, and felt the wind around her start to warm up. Somehow, she had freed herself from being a prisoner of her own pain. Her intrusive thoughts and her anger didn’t own her anymore. Thirteen felt more like herself than she ever had before. 

The Mind Flayer finally raised its head. It raised one of its arms, ready to swing it at Thirteen. Thirteen glared at the building, setting fire to the roof immediately. 

“Woah,” Thirteen breathed, breaking her concentration to look at her hands. That was easier than it had ever been. Some sense of justice in her mind had freed her of her bitterness, leaving her with control and power. The Mind Flayer moved away from the burning building, still swinging its arm at the girl.

Thirteen snapped her head back up to see a tornado coming right towards her. She faced her palms toward the Mind Flayer’s arm, bracing herself. Images of the grey mass spinning around Dr. Taylor’s body, leaving her with a sense of evil and those ice powers flashed through Thirteen’s mind. The tornado was almost there, and Thirteen could already feel the winds hitting her face. She closed her eyes and prepared for the worst. It would hit her any second now.


	27. Mind Flayer

But it didn’t. Thirteen stood still, keeping her arms up but not daring to open her eyes. After a few seconds too long, she noticed the lack of cold winds and looked up. She saw a strange darkness, as the grey winds swirled around her. But they couldn’t touch her. Her arms were extended on either side of her, and an orange light radiated around her palms, shielding her from the tornado.

Thirteen opened her mouth in surprise. Somehow, she had created a little bubble for herself. It was too hot for the Mind Flayer to touch her. She laughed to herself, and felt fresh blood fall under her nose. She held her arms up and waited for the tornado to give up.

The Mind Flayer seemed to scream in anger. It took its arm away from the girl, who smiled up at it, mockingly. It stamped its spider-like legs and reached into the ground. 

The earth cracked under Thirteen’s feet. She yelped and fell too her knees. She raised an arm at the Mind Flayer in warning, as she scrambled away from the soil that was tearing apart from itself. The cracks uncovered a sea of vines that stretched toward her, ready to wrap themselves around her ankles and drag her into the dirt. Thirteen got to her feet and tried to run from the broken ground, but it kept following her. The cracks were right on her heels when she turned back to the building. She saw the entrance to the building underneath the Mind Flayer, and made a beeline for it. Grey particles shot out of all the cracks in the earth along with the vines, blocking her way. Thirteen raised her arms in front of her again, and started running towards the wall of swirling winds. 

She charged forward and blocked all the tentacles of grey particles that tried to reach her. She jumped through the wall, and all the grey particles scattered around her. Winds tried to push her back, but Thirteen dug her feet into the soft ground. She looked up at the Mind Flayer’s head, and let out a yell. The Mind Flayer fought off the fire, hissing like a snake. The winds let up and Thirteen was able to make it to the building. She wrenched open the door and ran inside. 

Thirteen stopped in her tracks. Before her was a long hallway with seemingly infinite doors. The white cinderblocks were all too familiar to her. This building was just like the one where she had lived all her life. 

Thirteen blinked and she was back there now, running through the hallway, searching desperately for an exit. She was opening each door, finding only desks and chairs. She was in a panic, out of her mind in the middle of the desolate building that felt like a maze.

That’s what she saw in front of her. It was those same white cinderblocks, now stained red, with dark vines intertwined on the walls. Thirteen turned to face the door, ready to flee the building, but she had to stop herself. It was either this building or the Mind Flayer. She turned and felt her heartbeat pick up as she stared down the hallway. 

This is what it wanted. This is why it led her to that building. Somehow, Thirteen knew that the Mind Flayer had been watching her for her whole life. It knew that she was afraid of buildings like this one. It was just trying to use her past against her, and distract her. She couldn’t let it work.

Her feet carried her unenthusiastically along. Her heart skipped a beat with each door she passed, as she saw the empty tables and chairs through the small windows. She held onto her burn mark while she walked. She passed a large blue paw print painted onto the wall, cowering away from it as if it would reach out of the wall to scratch her. 

Thirteen continued to wander through the hallway, trying not to think about the building she was in the middle of. She needed a plan, and she needed to get out of this building. She wished she knew some way to defeat the Mind Flayer. She could shield herself, and she could try and burn it more, but there was no guarantee that it would do anything. 

She turned a corner and found a doorway that led outside. The red light from the sky streamed in through the windows, and Thirteen felt a sickness in her stomach at the sight of it. Thirteen approached the doors, seeing the field behind them. After a deep breath full of cold air, Thirteen pushed through the doors, running out into the open field. 

The Mind Flayer was waiting for her. Thirteen instinctively pushed her hands in front of her, shielding herself from the winds. She found herself in the middle of the field, staring up at the monster. Its dark grey particles screamed in its rage, and lightning flashed behind it. Thirteen set fire to it again, but it quickly put the fire out.

The monster was stretching its arm out to her again, but Thirteen was ready. She used all her strength to burn the monster again, holding the heat there for as long as she could. The monster hissed and screamed its near-deafening scream, sending swirls of grey in every direction. 

It’s form went away, and Thirteen was surrounded by what looked like a dust storm. Clouds of those grey particles rushed at Thirteen from every side. She held her arms up to block it, cementing her forcefield of heat. The grey winds didn’t just swarm around her, they were trying to pierce the shield. They hit closer and closer to Thirteen, who began to feel her dehydration and hunger come back in waves. 

The grey was below Thirteen too, and she felt herself rising into the air. Her elbows bent, as her bubble got smaller. It wasn’t looking good, but Thirteen wasn’t going to give in. She closed her eyes and focused with all her might.

_This is for Eleven._

Her thoughts seemed to echo all round her, trapped inside the bubble with her and repeated by each spinning grey particle that hit against her shield. 

Thirteen pushed her arms away from her body. She let out a scream and shut her eyes hard. The world was in slow motion. Blood gushed from her nose and ears, and the veins on her face turned the dark purple color that lived underneath her eyes. 

As she extended her arms, the orange light that grew from her hands like flames turned into a bright red, sprouting from her palms like vines. The heat that Thirteen produced was unlike anything natural in this world. Sweat dripped down her face and drenched her body, but Thirteen didn’t notice. She kept screaming and pushing out with all her might. 

The grey particles around her screamed back at her. They were flung away from the girl, repelled by her heat and her power. The Mind Flayer knew it was no match for the girl.

Thirteen’s arms had extended all the way, and she there her neck back too, letting her screams fill the empty world. Fire shot from her arms, and each grey particle that surrounded her burst into flames. It was an explosion, rocking the world and echoing through the sky like the sounds of an airplane. The grey particles kept spinning around wildly, not sure what to do in the chaos. Each one that dared to come close to her was turned to ash, raining down from the sky like a dark snow.

Thirteen was floating there in the sky, with lightning from the red storm clouds fracturing the air around her and a sea of dwindling grey screaming in pain and defeat. 

But Thirteen didn’t hear the thunder or see the Mind Flayer burn and turn to ash around her. She didn’t feel the heat or the sweat on her body. She didn’t taste the blood that streamed into her mouth. Thirteen was talking to her mother.

“I burned the lab down. It’s gone now,” she was saying. “And I killed Dr. Taylor, the woman who took me away. I killed the Mind Flayer too. None of them will hurt anyone else anymore, Mom.”

“I’m so proud of you,” El said. She was lying in the blanket fort, wearing her flowered dress. But there were no blood stains on her clothes and no maggots in her hair. El was very much alive, smiling at Thirteen and holding her charcoal-covered fists in her soft, warm hands.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t save you.”

“No, I’m sorry I couldn’t save you,” El said.

“Dad told me to tell you that he loves you and that he never stopped looking for you,” Thirteen told her. “I love you too. And I never stopped looking for you either. Nobody really did. All of your family loves you so much.”

El didn’t say anything, but her sad smile widened. She gripped her daughter’s hands harder and looked into her eyes, hoping to communicate without words the way she always did.

“I don’t want to die in the Upside Down,” Thirteen confessed. 

“You won’t. You can just stay here with me,” El told her. 

“I don’t want to die at all.”

“I know. I didn’t either.”

 

———

 

Thirteen’s body floated down from the sky as her power drained. The red flames that radiated from her palms faded into a soft yellow glow. Thirteen was alone in the sky now, surrounded only by the dark blue air of the Upside Down. The grey particles were all turned to ash, and the red storms had died with the Mind Flayer.

Thirteen laid on a bed of ash and smoke in the middle of the field. The blood under her nose was starting to dry and the heat left her body like steam. 

Thirteen was already unconscious, blind to the green light that ripped through the cracks in the dirt. It was the only light in this world now.


	28. The Last Gate

Hours had passed since anyone had bothered to speak. Nancy kept to herself working, Dustin, Lucas, and Steve watched _Jeopardy_ , Will sketched portraits of his friends to distract himself, Jonathan played puzzle games on his phone, and Max texted her wife. 

Mike sat by himself in the guest room, writing. He had gotten into the habit of writing when he felt overwhelmed. When he missed El, he would write short stories about her. They were all based in truth and mainly told the story of how they had met and how she saved them so many times, but Mike liked to fabricate some bits. In his stories, Mike never got mad at El. When they saw Will’s body pulled from the river, he didn’t yell. Instead he walked his bike home with El, telling her that he understood what she was trying to do. That felt better to Mike. He didn’t like remembering the messy parts of their lives, like when they broke up or when they got in fights.

Today, Mike wasn’t writing his usual short stories. He was writing a letter to El. He told her about Thirteen and how brave she was, and how she wanted to meet her mother more than anything. He told her about how he didn’t stop looking for her, and how he would’ve looked forever if he thought there was a chance that she was alive. He told her about the life they could’ve had together. The three of them as a family was all Mike wanted.

After hours of writing in silence, Mike heard a voice break the silence.

“It moved!” Dustin’s voice was shouting from the living room. Mike threw his notebook and pencil onto the bed and burst out of the guest room.

“It moved?” Mike asked, hovering in the doorway.

“It moved,” Dustin repeated, smiling. “She’s southwest of here.”

The small compass in Dustin’s palm was finally pointing in a different direction than the compass on the phone screen. The group stood up and slipped their shoes off, ready to go.

They sprinted outside and piled into the two cars parked in the street. Dustin and Steve were driving, with Dustin in the lead. Mike sat in Dustin’s passenger seat, holding the compass in his shaking hands.

“Left,” Mike directed him. Max and Jonathan peered over Mike’s shoulder at the compass. Max had her fingers crossed, praying that they would find Thirteen.

“Go right,” Mike said.

“This isn’t the way to the lab,” Will said in the other car. Steve drove behind Dustin, while Nancy and Will tried to guess where the gate had been opened.

“I figured she wouldn’t go back there,” Nancy said. “But where else would she go to open the gate?”

Lucas sat silently in the backseat of Steve’s car, feeling more nauseous with every second. He needed Thirteen to be okay. 

“Left,” Mike called. 

“We’ve already gone this way,” Jonathan said.

“We’re going in a circle,” said Dustin. 

“Then the gate’s inside the circle,” Max suggested. Dustin parked the car.

“Hawkins Middle School,” Steve said, pulling his car into the parking space next to Dustin’s. “Why would she open the gate at the middle school?” His question was left unanswered, as the group climbed out of the cars.

“It’s somewhere this way,” Mike said, pointing towards the entrance of the school. The group followed Mike quickly to the front doors. 

“It’s locked. School let out hours ago,” Dustin said.

“Nance?” Mike looked to his sister. If anyone knew how to get through a locked door, it would be her. But Nancy shook her head.

“Maybe she’s not inside,” Jonathan suggested. The group agreed, and started hopping the fence. They walked around the school, with everyone crowded behind Mike as he stared at the compass.

They got to the back of the school, and Mike guided the group towards the field. Will got a sick feeling in his stomach, as did Mike, Lucas, Dustin, and Max. They were headed for the exact spot that Will got possessed by the Mind Flayer.

_Will, wake up!_

_I felt it everywhere._

Will fiddled with his bracelets and Max rubbed his shoulder to comfort him as they walked. 

They had trekked into the middle of the field, all staring down at the compass, when Lucas shouted out.

“There!”

In front of them was a hole, glowing blue and orange. Dark tendrils swept across the surface, and pieces of the dirt around it seemed to be moving like a heartbeat, fast and irregular.

The group stood around the hole, afraid to move, until Lucas stepped forward.

“I’m going in,” he said.

“Me too,” Mike told him.

“I am too,” Steve joined in.

“Me too,” said Max.

“I’m in,” Nancy declared.

“I’m in too,” Dustin told the group.

“Me too,” Jonathan said.

It was only Will left. He stood in the back of the group, staring fearfully at the gate, a trapdoor into his worst nightmare. Will was breathing heavily, squeezing his left wrist, and seemed to be going pale.

“You don’t have to go, Will,” Mike told him. Will looked up from the gate and stared into Mike’s eyes. Mike moved closer to him, putting his hands on Will’s shoulders. “It’s okay,” he reassured him. Will felt the cold metal of the compass in Mike’s hand through his shirt, and a shiver went through his body.

“I have to go,” Will said. “For Thirteen and El.”

“Are you sure?” Max asked him, looking from her friend to the glowing pit in the ground. Will nodded bravely.

Lucas got to his knees in front of the gate. He stuck a leg inside gingerly, like he was testing the waters in a cold pool. With one leg inside, Lucas slowly slipped another leg into the gate.

“What do you feel?” Jonathan asked.

“Gravity,” Lucas answered. It felt like he had his legs in the air, with gravity pushing them back down, or up.

“You’re in two dimensions at once,” Dustin commented, amazed. Lucas smiled. He took a breath and pushed himself into the gate.

Lucas felt his legs hit the soft ground, and he pulled his head out of the gate. He was kneeling on the ground in the Upside Down. It was an indescribable feeling. This was something that he’d had explained to him a million times, between El and Will, but the closet he’d ever gotten was the tunnels. Lucas looked around him. He saw the vines stretching along the ground, and up the walls of the middle school in the distance. The sky was cloudy and blue, like a rainstorm. There was a strange stillness in the air, and those familiar particles floated like snow around him. Lucas felt like he’d entered Narnia. 

His magical feeling was killed when he saw the body. At his feet, ash littered the earth. Ten feet away, a body was lying in the ash, unmoving. Lucas froze, afraid to even breathe.

Mike and Will climbed through the gate next. Mike was helping Will, who looked on the verge of tears. Dustin and Nancy appeared next. They were all so concerned with calming Will that they didn’t notice Lucas, or the small body in the ash. Jonathan and Max were in next, followed closely by Steve. 

Finally, someone noticed Lucas. Nancy tapped on his shoulder, but he didn’t move. She followed his gaze, and saw the body. It was unmistakably her niece, dressed in the clothes she had given her. Nancy gasped and felt her heart stop. Steve and Max were the next to notice her. Then, Jonathan saw. Will looked over Mike’s shoulder and froze. Mike looked back and saw his daughter.

“Thirteen,” he choked. He scrambled to his feet and ran through the ash to her side. Thirteen was covered in blood and ash. Mike held her in his arms.

“Thirteen, wake up,” he begged. Tears ran down his cheeks as he held the last trace of El close to his heart. Though there was no pulse, her body was still warm. Mike’s breath stopped as hope leapt in his heart.

“She’s still warm, she might still be alive! Someone help me,” Mike called out, his voice breaking as he cried, trying to find any sign that Thirteen was okay.

Lucas snapped back to reality. It wasn’t over. He ran to Mike and Thirteen. His years of working as a police officer and helping injured people was the most valuable thing to him in that moment. Lucas pulled Thirteen from Mike’s arms and laid her on her back. He started performing CPR on her. After 30 compressions, he lifted her chin and put his ear over her mouth, hoping for signs of breathing. None came.

“Come on,” he pleaded. He pinched her nose and breathed into her mouth twice. He did CPR again.

Thirteen gasped. She coughed and Lucas breathed a sigh of relief. He pulled her into the recovery position for CPR. Mike held her hand in his, afraid to let go and smiling through his tears. The rest of the group approached Thirteen, all crying. Thirteen tried to speak to greet them, but she was too weak.

“She needs to get to a hospital,” Lucas said, wiping sweat from his forehead. Mike and Lucas lifted Thirteen’s body. They passed her through the gate to Steve and Dustin, who were waiting on the other side. Max, Nancy, and Jonathan had climbed through, but Mike turned around to face the Upside Down.

“You okay?” Lucas asked.

“I just realized that this is the first time I’ve been in the same world as El in eighteen years,” Mike said. Fresh tears pooled in his eyes, and Will bowed his head in sadness.

“I have to go see her,” he said. “To say goodbye.”

“Mike, you can’t. We have to get Thirteen to the hospital. And you shouldn’t stay in here for too long, because we don’t know what’s still living here,” Lucas advised. He nudged the ash on the ground with his foot.

“Maybe before Thirteen closes the gate, you can go see her,” Will offered. “If she thinks that’s safe,” he said, when he caught Lucas’s gaze.

“Okay,” Mike said. “If I don’t see you later, goodbye El,” he told the Upside Down. Lucas helped Mike through the gate, then climbed through himself. Will looked around at his nightmare world. He felt sick at how familiar it all was. 

“You coming, Will?” Lucas asked, peeking his head through the gate.

“Yeah,” Will said. Lucas offered Will his hand, and Will took it, breathing his last breath in the Upside Down.

Once Will was out of the Upside Down, he saw that Dustin was holding Thirteen, who looked weak and barely conscious. Nancy was wiping the ash and blood off of Thirteen’s face with a makeup wipe. Steve and Max were running across the field to them, carrying a bundle of wooden stakes, caution tape, and a blue tarp.

They set up a large perimeter around the gate, where every stake was placed just out of view of the gate. Steve covered the gate with the tarp, nailing it into the ground. He weaved caution tape around the stakes.

Dustin carried Thirteen back towards the cars, with the rest of the group walking closely beside them, saying comforting things to Thirteen, who was still too weak to respond.

Mike, Lucas, and Nancy piled into the backset of Steve’s car, and Dustin draped Thirteen over their laps. Max called shotgun, and left Will, Jonathan, and Dustin to drive in Dustin’s car.

Steve drove quickly to the hospital, using his siren to get there quicker. Thirteen winced at the noise, and Nancy covered her ears for her. Once they reached the hospital, Steve shut his siren off and pulled over in front of the entrance. Lucas picked up Thirteen, and carried her into the hospital.

“What’s the patient’s name?” The lady at the front desk asked a simple question, but it stumped Lucas.

“She doesn’t have one,” Mike said. The lady raised her eyebrows at him, clearly noticing that he looked nearly identical to the girl.

“Jane Doe,” the lady said. Mike tried not to flinch at the name. He had never really called her ‘Jane’, but at their wedding, the priest had used her real name.

_Do you, Jane Hopper, take Mike Wheeler…_

He shook the memory from his mind. There were more urgent things than grief right now.

Soon, a nurse came out and guided Lucas through a hallway. They gave Thirteen a private room. She did a brief examination of Thirteen, then hurried out of the room. They were told that the doctor would be in soon, and the door was closed on them. Nancy dug through her purse.

“What are you doing?” Mike asked. Nancy didn’t answer, but instead kept digging. She finally produced a small bottle, a powder, and a makeup brush. She leaned over Thirteen’s bed and held her left arm out. She covered the tattoo on Thirteen’s wrist with the makeup and sealed it with the powder.

“Avoiding unnecessary questions,” Nancy answered after she’d finished.

The doctor came in to do tests on Thirteen. She was nervous around the doctor, but she got through it. The doctor’s questions about Thirteen were hard to dodge. Mike ended up admitting that she was his daughter, but explained that there was no birth certificate or any records for her. The doctor quickly learned to stop asking questions, and kept to her work. 

After a few hours had passed, Nancy went out to the waiting room, where the rest of the group was sitting. Nancy had been texting them, talking about the feeding tube and IV that Thirteen had. Nancy had to explain again that they weren’t allowed to go see her, to avoid overwhelming her. Steve passed her a cup of coffee that he’d gotten, and Nancy drank it happily.

“I’m glad this is all over,” she sighed, slumping into a chair beside Will. But she worried that it wasn’t over. Thirteen still hadn’t spoken since she’d been rescued, and nobody knew for sure that the Mind Flayer was gone. They had left the gate open and unattended, which gave Nancy little jolts of anxiety every time she thought about it. And El was still dead. A cloud of grief hung over the group as they sat, watching the clock on the wall approach 1:00am.


	29. Aftermath

The morning of Thursday, April 19, was a slow one. Mike, Lucas, and Nancy had stayed in the hospital with Thirteen all night, but the rest of the group had gone back to Lucas’s house. Max and Steve, who had drank too much coffee and couldn’t sleep, had broken out Lucas’s tequila and made margaritas. The sound of the blender woke up Dustin, Will, and Jonathan, who had reluctantly accepted their margaritas from Steve. The five of them sleepily gathered in the kitchen, and toasted El.

“To El Wheeler, who brought real magic into our lives,” Max had declared, raising her glass.

“To El, a hero who we owe our lives to,” Will said.

“To Eleven, the girl who saved our asses too many times to count,” Steve toasted.

“Specifically mine,” added Will, with a small smile.

“To Jane Hopper, who overcame a lifetime of pain to become the hero who touched each of our lives,” Jonathan said.

“Well said,” Steve remarked.

“To El, our friend,” Dustin said simply.

“To El,” the group said in unison, clinking their glasses together and taking drinks of their margaritas.

“And to Thirteen, who has shown bravery and kindness that El would be proud of,” Jonathan added, raising his glass again. The group repeated their chorus and drank again. 

The five of them woke up at 8:00am, at Will’s alarm. They all groaned and buried their faces in their pillows at the repetitive beeping on Will’s phone. They had agreed to meet Nancy, Mike, and Lucas at the hospital at 8:30 to talk about Thirteen, but they would rather sleep for the rest of the day. Reluctantly, Will and Steve got up and started getting ready to go, trying their hardest to get the others up. Steve was used to running on little sleep, as his kids were still pretty young and liked to wake him up early. He made a pot of coffee and poured himself some cereal. Will took a quick shower and grabbed a banana to take to the hospital.

With five minutes before they were supposed to meet the others at the hospital, Max, Dustin, and Jonathan finally got up. Will sent Mike a text, letting him know that they would be late, as Max and Jonathan waited outside the bathroom for Dustin to get out of the shower.

It was nearly 9:00am when the group left the house. They drove quickly to the hospital, still exhausted but eager to hear how Thirteen was. They stopped by the middle school, happy to see that the tarp covering the gate was still intact, and the middle schoolers weren’t bothering it.

“Hey, what took you guys so long?” asked Mike, who looked well-rested, despite sleeping in a chair all night.

“Dustin was hogging the shower,” Max grumbled. Will and Steve raised their eyebrows at her, and she scowled at them. She was not a morning person.

“How’s Thirteen?” Jonathan asked, changing the subject.

“She’s good. She’s talking now,” Nancy said. “Lucas is with her now. She told us about what happened in the Upside Down.”

“What happened?” Will and Dustin asked in unison.

“After she broke the radio, she went to the lab,” Mike started.

“To open the gate?” Steve asked, puzzled.

“No, to burn it down. All the way this time. Because it hurt so many people.”

“When she got there, she didn’t want to burn it down with Twelve’s body still in the basement, so she got her out and buried her. Then, she set the lab on fire, and it collapsed,” Nancy said.

“And then, she went to find the Mind Flayer, to kill it, because of all the people it had hurt,” Mike said. “She found it over a building she’d never been to.”

“Hawkins Middle School,” Dustin said.

“Yes, exactly. So she tried to fight it, but couldn’t. She says that the thing that always made her able to use her powers was a dream she had, where it was her hurting Twelve, instead of the other way around.”

“Dark,” Steve said.

“Yeah,” Nancy said. “But she didn’t want that to be the thing that motivated her, so she told the Mind Flayer that she wasn’t evil like it was, rejecting that part of her that wanted to be violent.”

“After that, she was able to use her powers easier, somehow. She said that the Mind Flayer tried to get her, but she was able to use her powers like a forcefield of heat,” Mike said happily. Telling this story reminded him of seeing Star Wars the first time as a boy, and then immediately going to tell his mom all the exciting details he remembered.

“She said that when the Mind Flayer attacked, she went into the school for shelter. But she was afraid of the school, because she said it was nearly identical to the building she grew up in and escaped from,” Nancy continued.

“A school?” Will asked. What could be so threatening about a school?

“Yeah, a school. She mentioned the desks and chairs and the hallways and classrooms with posters,” Mike explained, frowning. “We’ve tried to get her to tell us more about it but it’s a little overwhelming for her right now.”

“All morning, Mike and I have been trying to find abandoned schools near here. I think we found the one she was kept at,” Nancy said, pulling up a website on her phone. She showed a picture of an old school building. The words _Longmont High School_ were set in concrete above the front doors. The Brutalist brick building reflected the simple American architecture of the 1960s and 1970s: plain, yet strong.

“This is in New Whiteland, Indiana. It was abandoned because of a fire that started mid-winter of 1994, during record-breaking cold temperatures. They closed down the school and sent all the kids to the other school in town, and nobody’s been inside since then.”

“So why do you think that this is the school?” Max asked.

“We found this news article from the local newspaper online, and it has this picture-” Mike started, as Nancy pulled up another picture. 

It was unmistakably a young Dr. Taylor, posing alongside several other doctors. The caption read _Dr. J. Taylor, Longmont High Graduate, Recognized for Thesis on Capabilities of the Human Mind_. 

“So, that’s it, it has to be,” Steve said.

“Yeah, and look at this,” Nancy said, going to a third article. It was another article from the New Whiteland newspaper, featuring the caption _Abandoned High School Burns Again._

“It’s an article talking about a small fire in the supposedly-abandoned school in 2016, nearing the twenty-second anniversary of the first fire,” Nancy explained. “They say it was haunted, but I think it was the fire that Thirteen set on her first escape attempt.”

“Okay, so what do we do?” Max asked. “Twelve is dead, so it’s not like we could get her arrested.”

“We have to prove that Dr. Taylor abducted Thirteen, and this is how. We can say that El died in childbirth, and her doctor, Dr. Taylor, took the baby and got rid of all the evidence that El was at that hospital, to make it look like she’d gone missing. We can get proof that she kept Thirteen in this school, and then all we have to do is get Thirteen a birth certificate and everything,” Mike explained.

“It’s not really a lie, it just leaves out all the pyrokinetic powers and inter-dimensional monsters,” Dustin remarked cheerfully.

“What about how Thirteen escaped, and where Twelve went?” Will asked.

“We tell the truth. We can say that Thirteen attacked Dr. Taylor with a broken soap dispenser, which is true, and left to find Hopper, which its also true. And that’s how she found Lucas, who brought all of us together. Maybe we can just say that we don’t know what happened to Dr. Taylor.”

“But wouldn’t they think that Thirteen killed her, if the last time anyone saw her was when Thirteen attacked her with the soap bottle?” asked Jonathan.

“Well, her car is still parked near the lab, so clearly she tried to follow Thirteen back to Hawkins. Her thesis mentioned the MKUltra project, which took place in that lab, so maybe we just exaggerate some details about her,” Nancy said. “Maybe she tried to recreate some of the experiments that were rumored to have happened in the lab, and when her subject escaped, she tried to set fire to the lab in anger. Maybe that fire got out of hand and killed her.”

“Water it down,” Jonathan said, looking impressed at Nancy, who smiled.

“We make her into a villain out of a story. A psychopathic mad scientist character who kidnapped a poor little girl to do experiments on. Dr. Taylor’s work gets discredited and Thirteen gets to live a normal life,” Nancy finished. Her career as an investigative journalist had taught her a lot, but Nancy’s favorite technique was from her first lesson in bringing justice. 

Mike smiled at his sister. The feeling of bringing justice to El and Thirteen filled his heart. He could understand why Nancy loved her career so much.

“How do we get the story out?” Max asked.

“I’m going to write an article about it,” Nancy told her. “And we’re going to go to the police station later today and file a report about it.”

“What about the gate?” Steve asked.

“Thirteen said she can close it, as soon as she gets out of the hospital, which should be soon. She’s doing a lot better already, so it should only be a few more days.”

“And then what?” Jonathan asked. “We all go home to New York, Chicago, San Diego?”

The group was silent. As much as they missed their families, it would be hard to go back, leaving Mike and Thirteen behind. Especially considering all of the time they’d missed. They wouldn’t be there to get to know Thirteen.

“I’m moving back,” Will announced, breaking the silence. He’d saved up enough from his art shows to rent a small place in town, and now that Mike was back and Thirteen was rescued, there wasn’t a lot keeping him in Chicago.

“I am too,” Nancy said, smiling. She could be a journalist from anywhere, and she had already called her boss to let her know. 

“I can move back too,” said Jonathan.

“I can’t move,” Steve said. “But I live close so I can bring my family through here pretty often. I want to introduce you all to the twins.”

“I can’t move either, but I can fly back more often. Maybe I’ll bring the family sometime,” Max said. They were going around the circle now, feeling a strange warmth as they remembered their closeness. It was comforting to make these plans, after not knowing when they’d be back in Hawkins for so many years. This time, they were committed to their town and their friendships, and determined to not let themselves fall back into their old patterns of avoiding them.

“I’m moving back, obviously,” Mike grinned. Mike and Thirteen had a new life to set up. The group smiled at him, and only Dustin was left.

“Uh,” Dustin started. The group looked at him, eager to hear if he’d be joining them.

“Well?” Mike nudged him.

“I’ll talk to my wife,” Dustin said. The group cheered and laughed together, as Steve and Max winced, hungover. 

This was the happiest they’d been in their week in Hawkins. As they imagined their futures ,the atmosphere around the group was filled with a fresh hope, like a sunrise, with only that small cloud of grief left in the air. El was still on the back of their minds, as was the open gate and Thirteen’s health. But the group was finally starting to breathe freely again, in a way they hadn’t in eighteen years.


	30. The World's Still Cold

The light above Thirteen’s bed was flickering. Not in an annoying way, but rather in an interesting pattern. It was a quick flash, then four long flashes, followed by three quick flashes and finally, two long flashes. The pattern repeated like that over and over again. Thirteen tapped her fingers along the edge of her sheets while she watched the light, letting her fingertips fall and bounce off the bed each time the light flickered. After a while, it was almost as if she could hear a song. It was a drumming, quiet but strong, like a far away marching band playing in unison with the light’s flashes and her fingers’ tapping.

Thirteen sang along to the song in her head. _Da-daa-daa-daa-daa-da-da-daa-daa._ Time was frozen still, as usual, and Thirteen was content to sit in her own little world.

This was the one familiar thing that Thirteen held onto from her time in the basement. As a kid, when she was bored of her toys, she would sit against the wall and lay her hand on her knee. She would tap her fingers in a particular order, over and over again. It was her thumb, middle finger, pinky, index finger, and ring finger. _One-Three-Five-Two-Four. One-Three-Five-Two-Four. One-Three-Five-Two-Four._

It was just that order, again and again, speeding up until she messed it up.It took concentration, and Thirteen would repeat the game again and again for as long as she could. She found that when she let her mind wander, she could repeat the pattern for longer before she made a mistake.

This rhythm had a song too. Even when Thirteen’s mind was blank, that song would play in her mind as long as she was drumming her fingers softly on her leg.

When she had her hair shaved off, her number tattooed on her wrist, and her little freedom taken away, it was one of the few things Thirteen had left. This was the one game that wasn’t ripped away from her, because it couldn’t be. Late at night, Thirteen would lie in her bed, exhausted from Dr. Taylor’s tests and terrified of the nightmares that would be filling her mind the second she closed her eyes. She would just follow that rhythm, again and again, the only movement in the darkness. The song sounded louder in the quiet, and its melody comforted Thirteen until she couldn’t stay awake any longer.

“Thirteen?” A woman’s voice interrupted the song, and Thirteen snapped back to reality. She twitched and looked up at the door, fear in her eyes. For a second, Thirteen’s breath stopped and all of her muscles tensed up. A shiver went through her spine. She was back in the basement, and Dr. Taylor was opening the door to start the day’s tests.

But Thirteen let her breath out as she recognized Nancy’s face in the doorway. She laid her head back and tried to relax, but her heartbeat was booming in her ears. She looked to her left to see Lucas’s face, asleep in the chair by her bed. She knew that he had stayed up all night watching over her, and she felt more comfortable. 

Nancy entered the room and sat next to Lucas, setting her heavy, leather purse down on the tiled floor.

“How are you feeling?” Nancy asked, smiling at Thirteen.

“Better,” Thirteen responded, but her attention was turned back to the flickering light above her. Nancy sensed Thirteen’s distraction and sat back in her chair, busying herself with her phone. Thirteen caught this movement in the corner of her eye, and she felt a stab of guilt. This would be the next few days for them, just sitting in the hospital room and waiting for Thirteen to heal. Thirteen knew that the others were anxious to close the gate and get on with their lives, and she just wasn’t sure if she could do it.

While the others were planning their futures, Thirteen was worried that she wouldn’t fit in to any of them. The world beyond the basement was still scary to her, and ever since the danger had passed, Thirteen found herself intimidated by the unlimited world around her. It was a world that was always busy with systems, and was filled to the brim with people who had a place in those systems. It was big, it was complex, and it was exclusive. Thirteen felt like by being locked in a basement for her whole life, she had been locked out of the world.

Mike, Nancy, and Lucas had talked about getting her a birth certificate, and a name, and moving into a house in Hawkins with Mike. And in many ways, this was all she wanted. However, Thirteen was convinced that she would never reach that. She knew nothing about this world. It was in the back of her mind as she had walked through the town days earlier.

Each shop she passed, labeled with a word that was unfamiliar to her, was another piece of the town that she didn’t understand. What could be next for her? Mike said she could be homeschooled, and she could wear whatever clothes she wanted, and she could make friends. But Thirteen didn’t see how any of it was realistic. She worried that she was never going to stop thinking about the basement, and she could never move on from what scared her. 

The concealer that Nancy had put on her wrist the night before was rubbing off, and the faint numbers that marked her name were reappearing on her arm, inescapable and forever branding her.

_No._

Thirteen sat up. Nancy looked up from her phone and froze, waiting to see what Thirteen was doing.

Thirteen wouldn’t let herself be stuck in that basement anymore, not physically or mentally. She _would_ learn, she _would_ get a normal life, and she _would_ heal. Right now.

Thirteen fumbled with her IV. Despite Nancy’s warnings, she removed it from her arm. Her hands felt clammy and cold, and goosebumps appeared on her skin. She stood up.

Grey specks clouded her vision, and Thirteen stood still, getting her balance. After she blinked the grey specks away, she walked to the door.

“Thirteen!” Nancy exclaimed, waking Lucas. She jumped to her feet, but Thirteen was already out the door.

Thirteen walked down the hall, determined. She wandered quickly into the waiting room, passing the nurses who tried to stop her. Nancy and Lucas were walking quickly behind her, but Thirteen ignored their calls. She walked past the rest of the group, who had assumed their spot in the waiting room corner. Dustin noticed Thirteen first, and got the groups attention.

Thirteen’s white hospital gown almost matched her pale skin. The only color on her face was the purple under her eyes, which were focused on the door.

“Thirteen!” Nancy called again, catching up with Thirteen. She grabbed Thirteen’s arm, but it was burning hot, as if Nancy had touched a hot stove instead of a young girl. Nancy quickly released her arm, yelping and jumping back. Nancy looked from her burnt hand to Thirteen’s face. Thirteen looked as shocked as Nancy was, and the sorry look on her eyes seemed to apologize for her. But Thirteen turned and kept walking towards the doors, still on a mission. 

Dustin, Steve, and Jonathan ran to Nancy’s side, calling a nurse over to help. While they stayed behind, Mike, Lucas, Max, and Will followed Thirteen. Careful not to touch her and meet the same fate as Nancy, they trailed behind her, pleading with her to stop walking. Doctors and nurses tried to follow Thirteen too, but Will assured them that they had it under control.

Thirteen made her way through the building as if she’d been there millions of times before. She finally walked out the front doors and stopped. She felt the frigid air on her face and the freezing cold cement on her bare feet, and looked out into the street. The world was still cold. Thirteen was sick of the cold.

“Thirteen, please come back,” Lucas begged. But no one tried to stop her as she continued on, stepping into the street and letting the lazy midday traffic halt around her, as the drivers watched the girl in a hospital gown march across the road.

With her family behind her, Thirteen let her feet carry her through the streets of Hawkins. She wasn’t sure how, but she knew just where to go, in this town that she’d known for only a week. The spring flowers shivered in the cool wind, and the overcast skies gave the world around her a dull, desaturated look. With each heavy breath she let out, a light fog spilled out of her mouth and disappeared into the grey air.

The determined look on Thirteen’s face rivaled that of her mother’s. She passed unfamiliar brick houses and hundreds of the same tree, paying attention only to the wind that brushed back her hair.

Thirteen turned into the road leading up to Hawkins Middle School. She stalled for a few seconds, remembering the Mind Flayer’s spider-like legs over the school’s roof, silhouetted by the blood-red lightning. 

Instead of a giant monster, there was only a group of middle school students leaning along the edge of the brick wall, likely cutting class. Lucas ran in front of Thirteen, blocking her from continuing.

“I know what you’re going to do. And I’ll help you close it. But you can’t let those kids see you like this. I know the people in this town, and they’re all gossips. They’ll all hear about you and it’ll just make life harder for you,” Lucas explained. Thirteen shifted her weight and glared at Lucas, but he didn’t back down. Thirteen gave in and slumped her shoulders down, ending her and Lucas’s silent fight. He was right, and Thirteen needed to accept his help.

“Okay,” she said, emphasizing her bitterness in her voice. Unbeknownst to her, that was a textbook teenager tone, and almost made Lucas smile. Instead, Lucas forced down his smile and held his ground.

“And I need one more thing. I need you to promise that after you close the gate, you’ll come with us back to hospital, and you’ll stay there until you’re better. I know you’re impatient to get on with your life, but you need to be healthy, got it?”

“Okay. I promise.” Thirteen gave up her sharp tone and nodded at Lucas. Mike’s heart skipped a beat when she said those words, suddenly aware that her voice was identical to her mother’s. 

Lucas and Max left the others at the edge of the parking lot, making their way over to the group of kids posed against the wall in the menacing way that only popular kids in middle school could.

“Hey, are you guys supposed to be out here?” Lucas asked them. The kids scoffed and refused to yield their spot. 

“Are you?” One of the kids retorted, sneering at Lucas. The kid was tall, with blond hair falling into his beady, ice-blue eyes. He had a Juul in his hand, and he wasn’t bothering to hide it. His friends were looking up from their iPhones in interest, daring Max or Lucas to do something about it.

“Come on, guys. Let’s get to class,” Lucas tried again. His patience was already growing thin with these punks.

“Or what?” The tall kid asked bravely. He cocked his head to the side and straightened his back. Now, he was nearly eye-to-eye with Lucas.

Max, much shorter than the boy, but likely just as tough, clenched her fists. But Lucas, who stayed mere inches from the boy’s acne-riddled face, simply dug his hand into his pocket and kept his stare locked on the kid’s eyes.

The kid stepped back slightly, putting the Juul to his lips. He exhaled a thick cloud of smoke right onto Lucas’s face. The boy’s friends giggled behind him as he smiled, clearly proud of his cockiness. That was, until Lucas pulled his hand out of his pocket, holding a silver piece of metal labeled Hawkins Police Officer.

“Son, I’m a police officer. You wanna rethink that move?”

The kid’s face turned white as a sheet and his mouth hung open. His Juul fell from his hand and hit the cold ground. Without bothering to pick it up, the boy turned and ran through the grass, with his friends behind him.

Once the kids had turned a corner, Max and Lucas broke out in laughs.

“Why do you have that?” Max asked happily. Lucas held out his badge to show her. He moved his thumb off the bottom of the badge, revealing the word ‘Retired’.

“I got this when I retired. I found it in one of the boxes in my guest room, and figured I should hold onto it incase I needed it for something like this,” Lucas explained, placing the badge back into his pocket.

“‘Son, I’m a police officer. You wanna rethink that?’ Amazing,” Max quoted in a mock-policeman voice, teasing Lucas as they started off back towards the others.

“I heard Hopper say that to a kid once and I thought it sounded very cop-like,” Lucas defended himself. Max’s laughs faded.

“Do you miss being a cop?” she asked. Lucas’s smile faded too, and he looked at his feet as he walked.

“Yeah, but it was stressful. Hawkins isn’t the sleepy town everyone thinks it is. It has a dark side.”

Max nodded. “I think we would know that better than anyone,” she said, as they approached Mike, and Will, and Thirteen.

“They’re gone,” Lucas told them, smiling encouragingly at Thirteen.

“Yeah, it’s all clear,” Max said in her police officer imitation, laughing at Lucas’s glare.

Ignoring them, Thirteen took a step forward, marching into the grass and feeling the cold, damp ground on her feet. The blue tarp on the other side of the field fluttered in the wind, producing a crinkling noise that echoed through the trees.

As she walked, her palm was pressed tightly against her outer thigh, her fingers moving quickly in a familiar pattern. _One-Three-Five-Two-Four. One-Three-Five-Two-Four. One-Three-Five-Two-Four._


	31. Bonfire

Max ripped down the caution tape that surrounded the gate as Lucas stood guard, proud to play police officer again. Thirteen was flanked by Mike and Will. Mike was giving his daughter a pep-talk, although Thirteen was focused on the blue tarp in front of her, and Will was busy texting Jonathan to update him on where Thirteen went.

Max lifted the tarp off of the gate. The spores that floated through the Upside Down had collected underneath it, and soared through the air as soon as they were free. The gate itself remained unchanged from the day before. The grass and soil gave way to the baleful, blue gate, which seemed to be swallowing all the light that spilled down from the skies. That always-unfamiliar Upside Down goo balanced lightly across the top of the gate like strings of melted cheese, framed by some grey, serpentine substance. Only a small ray of cerulean light appeared through the gate, enveloped by the trenchant darkness that filled the Upside Down.

Thirteen stared into the depths of the gate as if she was staring into a puddle. But instead of her wavering reflection looking up at her, there was only a navy blue color, strong yet sickly. It was the same color as the dresses she had worn day after day, locked away from the world. 

“Are you sure you’re strong enough? We could always wait a few days for you to get better,” Will said. He stood on Thirteen’s left, staring into the gate along with her. Thirteen lightly angled her hands to face Mike and Will, sending waves of heat towards them, warning them step back. They retreated back to Lucas and Max, and the four of them watched Thirteen raise her arms to face the gate. 

Mike was suddenly aware that this was likely the last time the gate would be open. El was still in there, lying abandoned in his childhood home’s basement. He wanted to run forward and jump through the gate, run through the Upside Down, and find her body. Mike wanted to give El a proper funeral, convinced that leaving her in there was unacceptable. 

As though Will could hear his thoughts, he placed his hand on Mike’s wrist, looking into his eyes and silently telling him to stay back. El was okay there, lying peacefully in her blanket fort. Mike nodded at Will and leaned lightly against his side.

Thirteen’s thoughts were with El too. She pictured her mother’s face in the gate, looking up at her from the Upside Down, like the reflection in that puddle. The image of El was smiling at Thirteen, heavenly and happily. Her face was distorted by the texture of the gate, and Thirteen found that the more she stared at her, the more she started to fade away, until she was completely gone. Now, only the gate was staring back at Thirteen.

“Goodbye, Mom,” Thirteen said, barely louder than a whisper. The crinkling sounds from the tarp in Max’s arms drowned out her voice, keeping her farewell between Thirteen and her mother

Thirteen let the power that she’d gained from her fight with the Mind Flayer pour over her, flooding her veins with heat. Ash appeared over her palms as sweat appeared on her forehead. Without a moments notice, the gate was up in flames.

Fire licked through the air, exploding into sparkling hues of orange and yellow. Thirteen stumbled backwards, keeping her hands up to hold the fire steady. The flames grew taller and taller, its roaring and crackling masking the hisses of protest from the gate underneath it. It reached an impressive height, towering over Thirteen’s head.

 

Thirteen, dwarfed by the fire, leaned forward, letting the heat singe her hospital gown and send a wave of heat through her body. Her eyes were dry from the heat, but so much as a blink would break her concentration. Ash coated her hands and spread up her arms, darkening her wrists and concealing her tattoo again. Her eyes, red with dryness and more focused than they’d ever been, squinted at the fire, stinging yet unbothered by the blinding light.

The fire was a brilliant orange color that popped in the grey sky. Thirteen stood close by it, immune to its heat and concentrating her power on the base of the fire where the gate had been. She almost expected a stream of grey particles to spill through the gate, just like they had the last time she had tried to close it, but there was no Mind Flayer anymore. The fire burned brightly, unable to be quelled by the Upside Down’s limitless cold.

It was a bonfire, burning brightly, watching over an out-of-control party. Fireworks sounded in the distance, booming and ripping through the sky, leaving a grey trail smoking behind it. The campfire smell had caught on everybody’s clothes and residue from the melted marshmallows and s’mores stuck to their fingers. Fireflies twinkled in the still air, flying just high enough to safely avoid being captured.

Thirteen’s arms shook with power, and the fire only grew brighter with every passing second. The golden yellow heart of the fire emitted a brilliant light, causing everyone but Thirteen to step back and shield their eyes. The flames roared in front of the girl, twisting and shuddering in the cold winds. Thirteen seemed to be breathing out smoke, fingertips engulfed by the flames and eyes boring into the light.

She opened her mouth, letting out a thunderous roar that shook the ground. The fire blazed stronger than before, igniting a surge of light in Hawkins. On the overcast day, dark and cold, every lightbulb in town exploded with a blinding light. Headlights, lamps, and even phone screens swelled with brightness, as strong as the sun. The fire swallowed all of the darkness in Hawkins, heating and warming every corner of the previously-frozen town. Thirteen’s scream echoed through the streets, rolling through the air like the smoke from a bomb.

Mike, Lucas, Max, and Will were knocked to their feet. The heat that radiated from the fire was like an explosion, and only Thirteen could stand it. Lucas, sprawled out on the ground, saw the light glowing from each window of the school behind them. The warped silhouettes of students and teachers were shielding their faces from the bright lights, as projectors washed out their lessons with spectral light and the overhead bulbs exerted their overpowering fluorescence. By some miracle, the school was so busy with its outburst of light that nobody seemed to notice the bonfire blazing in the field. Thirteen let her scream fade, breathing the smoky air and letting the blood under her nose drip into her mouth.

She stood there as the fire started to die down. When the fire extinguished itself, it left behind only a smoking patch of dirt where the grass had been burnt away. The gate had completely disappeared from the earth. The lights that had been blinding moments earlier had completely gone out, leaving Hawkins in darkness, sitting silently under an umbrella of dark smoke. 

Thirteen’s knees buckled, sending her falling to the smoldering ground. Mike, Will, Lucas, and Max stumbled to their feet, blinking away the dark spots that obscured their vision. They ran forward, trying to help Thirteen to her feet. She coughed the smoke out of her lungs and let them roll her onto her back. She rested there in the grass, with shining sweat covering her skin and hot blood streaming from her nose. Instinctively, she wiped it away weakly with her blacked hand. Her eyes, reddened and teary, found Mike’s.

“You did it,” he told her, with the tears that rolled down his cheeks threatening to fall onto Thirteen as he hovered over her. Thirteen’s dark eyes closed as a small smile appeared on her face.

“I did it,” Thirteen mouthed weakly, throat sore after her yell. Mike and Lucas scooped her off the ground, carrying her back towards the parking lot. Parts of her hospital gown were charred from the fire and her skin was covered in ash and hot to the touch, but they didn’t mind.

“There you are. Is it closed?” Steve asked impatiently as they greeted him. He had been waiting in the parking lot, ready to speed back to the hospital. Steve had watched the cloud of smoke appear in the grey sky as the lights burned brilliantly, wondering if they were safe or if he should get ready to fight another monster.

“It’s closed,” Max informed him as she climbed into the passenger seat. Steve breathed a sigh of relief, but looked back at Thirteen with concern. Lucas loaded Thirteen, now unconscious, into the car. Once the backseat was filled, Steve started his car and took off to the hospital. 

As Steve drove, he saw that Hawkins was left in chaos. Cars were stopped along the road, their drivers bewildered and headlights refusing to turn on. People crowded in yards, asking if their neighbor’s lights were out too. Somewere pointing into the smoky sky, some were trying to power on their dead iPhones, and some were boarding themselves in their houses, accepting the apparent apocalypse.

In the passenger seat, Max nervously flicked through the apps on her phone, landing on her weather app. Hours earlier, the app had told her that the high of the day was 55 degrees, cold and overcast. But now, the high had somehow changed to 73 degrees. Max looked up at the sky, and found that the smoke was fading away and the clouds were passing through the blue sky, revealing the golden yellow sun. An orange, phosphorescent haze seemed to be glowing in the air, illuminating the unusually dark town. Max smiled at the miracle, praying that it was a sign that Thirteen would be okay.


	32. Safe

Steve pulled into the hospital, now crowded with people who had looked directly into the lights. The backup generator was on, and the hospital was one of the few places in Hawkins that wasn’t left powerless. One of the nurses who had tried to follow Thirteen out of the hospital appeared, shocked at the state of the girl now.

“What happened?” she cried. Will and Max looked at each other, unable to find an excuse.

“Um, there was a fire,” Max started.

“A fire?” the nurse asked, expecting a wave of burn victims to rush through the door and join the temporarily blinded people in the already overcrowded waiting room.

“Yeah, but it was a small fire. It’s out now,” Will said quickly. The nurse frowned at them, but led them through the halls of the hospital.

When they got back to Thirteen’s room, Dustin and Jonathan jumped up. Nancy peeked out from behind them, looking nervously at Thirteen. Her hand was bandaged and she looked to be in pain, but the sight of Thirteen made her forget her injury altogether.

“What happened?” Dustin asked, but Steve quickly kicked him, gesturing towards the nurse. Lucas laid Thirteen back down on her bed. The nurse began treating Thirteen, but bumped into the people who hovered around her bed.

“This room is too crowded,” she snapped, after tripping over Dustin’s foot and nearly falling.

“I’m sorry, but we’re not going anywhere,” Lucas told her. The nurse scowled at him, but continued doing her work.

“What happened?” Dustin said again, this time whispering to Max.

“The gate’s closed. But there was this huge fire, and… Do you remember when El closed the gate in ’84?” Max whispered back, keeping her eyes fixed on the nurse for any signs of eavesdropping.

“Yeah, and the headlights got all bright. That’s what that was?” Dustin whispered back excitedly, remembering the hospital lights glowing white minutes earlier. Max nodded and Dustin looked at Thirteen, impressed. Hawkins had lit up when El had closed the gate, but the overwhelming brilliance of the lights this time had been unlike anything Dustin had ever seen before.

The nurse left and quickly came back into the room, carrying a roll of wipes. She set to work cleaning the ash and dirt off of Thirteen. When she got to her right arm, she scrubbed at the black mark, failing to make the darkness fade with the ash. She shook her head and moved on to her other arm. Nancy’s heart skipped a beat as she saw the thin ink of Thirteen’s tattoo reappear on her wrist. Expecting some unanswerable questions from the nurse, everyone held their breath. But the nurse just continued wiping away the dirt, having learned her lesson about asking questions to this odd group.

Some time passed, and doctors and nurses flooded in and out of Thirteen’s room, clearly bewildered by the strange girl and the eight adults who refused to leave her side. The group huddled around Thirteen’s bed, watching the local news.

“The cause of the power surge remains unknown as authorities search for the source at the local power stations,” the reporter was saying.“Power has been restored to two-thirds of Hawkins already, and the remaining one-third should have power by the end of the night.” 

The weatherman came on the screen next, pointing on his green screen to the surprising increase in temperatures. One little sun icon hovered over Hawkins, stranded in a sea of the cartoon clouds that covered the rest of the east-central Indiana map.

Thirteen stirred, finally coming into consciousness and finding a crowd of familiar faces staring down at her. She smiled weakly at her family, happy to see them all in one place for the first time after being rescued from the Upside Down. They cooed over the girl, praising her bravery and telling her about the future she gets to have now. 

Mike talked about her staying with Lucas for a few weeks while he packed up his old house in Louisville and got them a new place in Hawkins. Lucas promised mountains of pancakes and hundreds of _Jeopardy_ episodes. Jonathan and Will told her about them moving back to spend more time with her, and reuniting the family they’d missed so much. Dustin proposed becoming her tutor if he moved his family back to Hawkins. Max and Steve revealed their family vacation plans to visit Hawkins again in the Summer, bringing their families with them. Lastly, Nancy took Thirteen’s hand with her injury-free hand. 

“I’m sorry for burning you,” Thirteen said weakly, her voice raspy and tired. A guilty look was in her eyes, and she silently prayed for Nancy’s forgiveness. Thirteen knew that the last time she had burned someone, they had burned her right back. But her aunt leaned in, smiling sweetly at her, no trace of anger on her face.

“It’s okay, Thirteen. It was only an accident,” Nancy said. Relief rushed through Thirteen, and she found herself welling up with tears. For the first time in her life, Thirteen was safe. Her family surrounded her, and all the evil that had followed her for eighteen years was gone.

This time, as she laid in her hospital bed imagining the future, Thirteen was hopeful. The promises of family and home filled her head and her heart. She stared at the TV screen, watching the town buzz happily with the excitement of the power outage, and she felt her place in this world.

Words that Thirteen couldn’t read were flashing on the screen, but she didn’t care, because she knew she could learn them, with Dustin’s help. Max’s hands were running through her short hair, the same way she always ran her hands through her sons’. The hospital’s chaos following the power outage had calmed down, and Thirteen was content to watch the sunset through her window, a soft, orange blanket that settled over the horizon, turning the trees yellow and the skies purple.

The nine people crowded into that small room enjoyed a night full of laughter, games, and burgers from the restaurant next-door. They read riddles and jokes to each other, told stories, and Steve taught Thirteen rock-paper-scissors, the game his kids were obsessed with. The night ended at 2am, when Thirteen finally fell asleep while the others were guessing one of Dustin’s riddles.


	33. Pink Eyeshadow

Spring finally hit Hawkins. The small town came alive, with car windows rolled down and music blasting, young kids playing in the park, and dogs happily chasing all the unsuspecting birds that chirped happily in the freshly mowed grass. 

Thirteen had been out of the hospital for a few days now, and was busy enjoying the freedom that she had worked for. She was staying with Lucas for another week, as Mike gave his two-weeks notice at work and packed up his small, sad house.

Max, Dustin, Jonathan, Will, and Steve were back at their homes, though they all FaceTimed Thirteen daily through her new iPad. Only Lucas and Nancy remained in Hawkins, watching over Thirteen and helping the others with their moving plans. 

Nancy, who was a workaholic, had saved up many vacation days, and cheerfully spent them with Thirteen. She used most of her time in Hawkins to carefully research Dr. Taylor and write about her kidnapping and abuse of Thirteen in search of impossible superpowers. She had already made her plans to fly back to New York at the end of May, pack up her stuff, and drive back to Hawkins with Jonathan. The two of them had decided to be roommates, moving into their nice apartment in Hawkins on June 1st.

Two long weeks after her arrival in Hawkins, Lucas and Nancy took Thirteen shopping. They went to the popular clothing store, where Thirteen passed into a group of teenage girls, carrying shopping bags and talking about their upcoming summer break.

Thirteen, who had only walked through the store in the Upside Down, was pleased to see that it was full of vivid colors and bright, summery clothes. Flanked by Lucas and Nancy, Thirteen roamed the store, her eyes unable to land on one pattern and her hands staying tightly at her sides, holding back from touching the clothes. 

“See anything you like?” Lucas asked. Thirteen simply nodded her head, but only looked around dizzily, overwhelmed by the onslaught of floral sleeves that poked out of each rack.

“Why don’t you pick something out?” asked Lucas, with an encouraging smile on his face.

“I don’t know what to pick.” Thirteen shot a small glare up at Lucas, anticipating that he would make fun of her for being indecisive. But Nancy stepped forward before Lucas could defend himself.

“What’s your favorite color?” Nancy asked.

“Um, orange, I think,” Thirteen said. “It’s the color of fire.”

“Here,” Nancy started, grabbing two shirts from a nearby rack of clothes. One shirt was a flowing, white tank top, featuring a smattering of tiny, orange flowers. The other was a large, knitted sweater, more soft than cotton candy. It was coral-colored, with lavender designs running across it. “Which one do you like more?” 

“That one,” said Thirteen, pointing to the sweater.

“What do you like about it?”

“It looks warm.”

“Okay, now try and find more things in the colors you like,” Nancy said, passing the sweater to Lucas for him to carry. She put the tank top back on the rack, smiling to herself. This reminded her of when she was a teenager, shopping for clothes with Barb.

“How much can I pick out?” Thirteen asked, looking excitedly around the store. It dawned on her that this was the first time in her life that she could choose what she looked like. The thrifted clothes that she wore to blend in were ill-fitting and unstylish, and she had only chose them because they were the closest to her. But this time, Thirteen was truly free.

“Well, you’ll need enough to fill a closet. That’s shirts, pants, jackets, and pajamas, at least,” Lucas said, wondering how big of a hit his credit card was about to take, but shaking the thought from his mind when he saw the delight on Thirteen’s face. 

After that, Lucas and Nancy followed Thirteen around the store, as she combed through each and every rack. She trekked energetically through the Women’s section, Men’s section, and even the Kid’s section, where she cooed over the tiny sneakers meant for babies. Nancy would offer some options to Thirteen and Thirteen would happily throw the clothes on top of the small pile that Lucas toted around.

At the end of their trip, Lucas held three sweaters, four summery tops, five striped, long-sleeved shirts, two oversized Men’s sweatshirts, three pairs of jeans, one pair of corduroy overalls, and one long skirt. Nancy carried some tank tops, a box of shoes, some socks, some undergarments, and a pack of small headbands. In the checkout lane, Nancy helped Thirteen pick out a bottle of red-orange nail polish, some face wash, three cucumber face masks, and a small, pink eye shadow palette.

Thirteen left the store swinging her shopping bags, beaming brightly. The sun warmed her skin as she climbed into Lucas’s car, letting the windspush back her short hair. The trees were blossoming and the grass flaunted their emerald color, happy to be rid of the harsh winter that stole their color. 

Spring brought a new smell that Thirteen had never smelled before. It came with the breeze, like some combination of freshly mown grass and a faint rose perfume. The infamous Ohio Valley allergies came with the heavenly scent, but Thirteen didn’t mind. The wind smelled like freedom, and freedom was worth a few runny noses. 

The evening was spent outside, enjoying the weather. Lucas cooked some burgers for dinner, and Nancy worked on her article in the backyard, her expensive laptop perching dangerously on the edge of the cheap, metal patio furniture. Just as dinner was served, Thirteen appeared in the doorway.

Her clothes were bold and mismatched, but still managed to suit her perfectly. Her hair was pushed back in a headband, revealing her freshly washed face and her pink eyeshadow. A black t-shirt with simple titian lines was just visible under a brilliant, Hawaiian-printed shirt. Reds and yellows exploded from the shirt, taking the shapes of flowers and palm trees. Her pants were simple, grey jeans, and a pair of pink socks with a pancake pattern peeked out from below the cuffs. Thirteen’s toes wiggled comfortably in her new shoes, a red pair of Vans. The stark white shoelaces laid, untied, over the cardinal-red sneakers.

“Paint my nails?” Thirteen asked Nancy, holding her new nail polish out. Her joy was settled into her voice, like rocks sealed into a wall.

“Let’s eat dinner first,” Nancy said, smiling widely at Thirteen and closing her laptop. Thirteen happily took a seat at the table, not minding the heat from the metal furniture. A warm breeze lazily shook the oak tree in Lucas’s backyard, and sent the cloud of smoke from the grill floating towards the table. Thirteen inhaled a haze of that savory scent, already enjoying her hamburger before she had even tasted it.

“You ever had a hamburger, Thirteen?” Lucas asked, pouring ketchup onto his burger.

“Yes, actually. Sometimes, when I would set fires for Dr. Taylor without putting up a fight, she would bring me McDonald’s for my dinner.” Thirteen spoke with her usual power and bitterness, joy gone from her voice.

“Sorry,” Lucas said quickly. Thirteen closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“It’s okay,” she said. The somber look on her face was echoed in her tone. Thirteen picked up her burger and took a bite. The burger was simple, yet juicy and warm, with seasoning that added flavor without being overly spicy. It certainly beat the lukewarm, greasy burger from McDonald’s.

“Woah,” Thirteen said, staring at the burger. “That’s amazing.”

“Yeah?” Lucas asked, proud of his cooking skills.

“Yeah,” Thirteen’s muffled voice responded, already full with her second bite. The light was already back in her eyes, which were completely enthralled by her meal.

Lucas and Nancy shared a look, and the three friends scarfed down their burgers and enjoyed a lighthearted conversation about the fashion trends of the 80s. Lucas retrieved some of his old photo albums and showed Thirteen the Party’s prom photo, from April 23, 1988.

Lucas, Max, El, Mike, Will, and Dustin were crowded into the picture. Silver stars hung behind their heads, like cheap halos over their ridiculous hair.

Lucas and Max appeared as platonic prom dates, three years after their mutual breakup. Lucas wore a tuxedo with a bright red bow, and Max sported a pastel yellow suit, a vivid red shirt underneath, and cropped hair, all a recreation of an Annie Lennox outfit that had earned her some stares. On the other end of the picture, Dustin, in a flashy maroon tux, had his arms around a blushing Will, in a mock-cliche prom pose. Dustin’s curly hair had reached his shoulders, and his Duckie-esque outfit juxtaposed Will’s simple, black tux. 

In the center of the photo, Mike and El smiled sweetly at the camera, the only real couple in the photo. After two years apart, they had just gotten back together. Two weeks before, Mike had asked her to be his girlfriend again in an, some (Max) would say, overly-romantic promposal. 

Mike wore a simple black tuxedo, complete with a white ruffled shirt and black bow tie. His dark hair was like a mop on his head, feathered and flopping over his ears. El, who’s long hair had grown far past her shoulders, had on a black, satin dress, with one large pink bow balancing at the side, perched atop a waterfall of ruffles.

Thirteen traced her fingertips over the clear plastic that held the photo inside the scrapbook. She locked eyes with her mother, feeling as if she was looking into a mirror. There, on El’s eyelids, sat a bright pink eyeshadow, nearly the same shade as the pink eyeshadow that Thirteen wore.

“Oh, wow, I forgot about that dress. I helped El pick it out, and I did her makeup too,” Nancy said. Thirteen smiled back down at her mother, tears in her eyes. Instead of bitterness and rage flooding her head and her heart, Thirteen felt only a love for El. She now had this connection to her, completely separate from the tattoo, the powers, and the pain. Pink eyeshadow, applied 30 years apart, and resting sweetly over warm, brown eyes linked the two young girls.


	34. Move-In Day

May came quicker than anyone expected. Before Thirteen’s amber nail polish could fleck off, Mike was arriving in town, his small green car loaded with stuff. 

“Thirteen!” Mike yelled happily, as the girl ran into the front yard to greet him.

“Dad!” Thirteen yelled back, running into his arms. The two hugged, laughing hysterically. It had only been two weeks since they’d seen each other, and they had FaceTimed constantly, but they did have nearly eighteen years to make up for.

Lucas, Nancy, and an energetic Thirteen hastily piled into Lucas’s car, following Mike to the small apartment building. The apartment was cramped, and a little plain, but they had two bedrooms, a few nice kitchen appliances, and even a small backyard.

The group got to work, quickly unpacking Mike’s car and putting together the IKEA furniture that Thirteen had picked out largely by herself. 

After a few hours of moving, Mike and Thirteen were all set. Thirteen explored the apartment. The kitchen was stocked with food, including small boxes of flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, vegetable oil, and chocolate chips. Milk and eggs were in fridge, and a measuring cup and a set of measuring spoons sat in a cupboard. Thirteen had already memorized Lucas’s pancake recipe, measurements and all, and was ready to make them in the morning. 

The living room was now home to a new couch, TV, and desk. Dozens of framed photos lined the wall. Mike and El’s wedding picture, the 1988 prom picture, a few drawings that Will made, and one picture of Mike and Thirteen that Jonathan had taken on the morning before Thirteen went to the lab to try and close the gate. On the desk, a picture of Mike, Dustin, Lucas, and Will dressed as Ghostbusters for Halloween rested next to a Wheeler family portrait from 1979, when Nancy was 12, Mike was 8, and Karen Wheeler was pregnant with Holly. 

Mike’s room was fairly sparse, housing only his clothes, new bed, and a few pictures of El. But Thirteen had brightened it up by giving him a clivia lily, placed on his nightstand, directly in front of his window.

Thirteen wandered into the bathroom next. A set of citrus scented candles, shampoo, perfume, lotion, and soap sat on the counter, a little housewarming gift from Nancy. Thirteen ran her hands over all the gifts, unwrapping and smelling them all. She squirted some of the lotion into her palm and rubbed her hands together, enjoying the soft feeling and lemony scent. Next, recognizing the candle from some tests Dr. Taylor had done, Thirteen narrowed her eyes and set the wick on fire with a small nod. In a little basket, Thirteen’s face wash, headbands, and toothbrush sat neatly. After another little squirt of the citrus lotion, Thirteen stepped into the last room, her own bedroom.

The walls, painted a light peach color,perfectly complimented the yellow curtains and matching yellow bedspread that Thirteen had chosen. Her wooden bed frame, nightstand, and dresser were all stained black. A fiery orange lamp sat on her dresser and her new iPad rested next to it, sporting a new case with a swirling design that resembled fire. Her brightly colored clothes were hanging

Her amber nail polish sat happily on her nightstand, in front of a framed photo of the party. Crowded into the frame was Nancy, Jonathan, Dustin, Max, Steve, Will, Mike, El, and two near-strangers, Joyce and Hopper. This picture was taken at their 1996 Christmas party. A brightly decorated tree was just visible behind the group. Mike and El were beaming, still wearing their reindeer antlers. Behind Steve, Lucas was just visible, wearing that third pair of antlers that Mike and El had forced on him earlier. But instead of looking defeated, Lucas was caught mid-laugh, looking at Dustin, who was making a goofy face and wearing a Santa hat. Next to Dustin, Nancy’s arms were up in frustration, clearly arguing with him, quite fruitlessly, to make a decent face for just one picture.

Standing on her new, red rug, Thirteen looked around her bedroom. _Her_ bedroom. Decorated with her new favorite colors, the colors of fire, it was her own space. It was free from the sickly blue dresses, cold food, and unrelenting tests of her old life. 

After a second look around her room, Thirteen noticed two boxes on her bed. She walked towards them, intrigued. She picked one up and ripped it open. A set of books spilled out, only making Thirteen more curious. After trying for a few minutes to read the unfamiliar words on the covers, she set the books down and moved on to the other package. This one was wrapped, revealing only a thin, flat shape below the striped wrapping paper.

Once the wrapping paper was tossed onto the floor, Thirteen stared at the gift, completely in shock. It was another framed picture, but bigger than the other pictures that littered the apartment. In the center of the frame, there was El’s face. Life-size and lifelike, it was as if she was really there. She was in her prom outfit, and her pink eyeshadow was more clear than the other picture. El smiled at her daughter. 

Seeing blurry movement in the corner of her teary eye, Thirteen looked up. Lucas, Nancy, and Mike were standing in the doorway.

“The books are a gift from Dustin. He’s going to teach you to read, through FaceTime at first, until he moves back here.” Mike stepped into Thirteen’s room, happy to see the smile breaking through her tears. 

“The picture is from Jonathan. He took it right before Mike and El left for prom, and got it printed and framed for you. He sent a note for us to read to you too,” Nancy said. She pulled a slightly tattered piece of paper from her jacket pocket and read it aloud.

“He says ‘Dear Thirteen, I hope you like the picture. El was a great sister to Will and I, but she would have made an even better mother. After she went missing, we thought we would never see her again, but you proved us wrong. You have so much of her in you. Thank you for reintroducing warmth into our lives. Sincerely, Jonathan.”

Thirteen sobbed softly, yet kept her smile on her face. Mike, Lucas, and Nancy hugged her, helped her dry her tears, and hung the picture on the wall. For the first time in her life, Thirteen understood the word _home_.


	35. Longmont High

The fifth of May was the one day that Thirteen had been dreading. Mike woke her up early, gently shaking her shoulders.

“Thirteen? Come on, time to get ready to go. We have to go to the school.”

Thirteen rolled over, groaning. The last thing she wanted was to go back to the place she’d been locked in for seventeen years. But it had to happen. She was the only person who could identify the basement room she was kept in. The only person who could bring Dr. Taylor’s cruelty to light.

Thirteen rolled out of bed, picking up the outfit that Nancy had chosen for her. The opposite of the bold, vibrant clothes she preferred to wear, Thirteen was told to wear this black dress, leave her hair free from her orange headband, and skip the pink eyeshadow, just for today. They were meeting some investigators and a photographer at the school, to confirm Nancy’s claims, interview Thirteen on tape, and take pictures for evidence and the article that Nancy was writing.

Instead of eating her cereal, Thirteen merely played with it. She swirled her spoon around, watching the sugary dust that coated each corn puff spin and diffuse into the milk.

“It’ll be okay, Thirteen,” Mike assured her. Thirteen believed him. It would be okay, but it would still be difficult.

It wasn’t long before Thirteen found herself sitting in the passenger seat of Mike’s car, driving back through Hawkins and back to her past.

Thirteen stared out the window, remembering the bus ride to Hawkins, weeks earlier. Even though she still recognized some landmarks, like the little, purple barn on a farm, the horses that grazed in the fields, and the pond that ran right along the road, Thirteen still felt like it had been years since she made her journey to Hawkins.

“Now entering New Whiteland,” Mike read aloud to Thirteen. She jerked awake, unaware that she had been dozing off. The roads were familiar, and she recognized them as the same roads she had walked down, just after her escape. Her mind was a haze, feeling detached as if she was traveling back in time, or exploring someone else’s memories.

All of a sudden, Thirteen realized that they had arrived. A black car, with two suited men standing by it, a red car that the photographer leaned against, fiddling with her camera, and Lucas’s car, with Lucas and Nancy still inside, were lined up in front of the school. 

Mike and Thirteen climbed out of the car. They were met with silence, as the investigators and photographer stared at Thirteen, who walked shyly behind Mike. 

“You’re Thirteen?” asked one of the investigators, stepping forward to greet them. His tone was professional, but a hint of intrigue was hidden in his voice. 

“Yes,” Thirteen replied. The camera clicked, and Thirteen jerked her head to face the photographer.

“Sorry,” the photographer said. “But it was a good shot, though.” She turned her camera to face Thirteen. On the small screen, an image of Thirteen appeared. The words ‘Longmont High’ were just visible behind her. Thirteen looked over her shoulder at the school. The cement plaque that stood over the front doors was engraved with words that Thirteen couldn’t read, but she understood.

“Can we see the tattoo?” The investigator asked. He looked hungrily at Thirteen’s arm. 

Thirteen held her arm out, revealing the black ink that refused to fade, no matter how much Thirteen wished it to. The photographer clicked away, as the investigators observed the tattoo, making notes in their small notebooks.

“Can you speak about the abuse you suffered?” That same investigator asked her, but Thirteen ignored him. She turned back to the front doors and pushed herself to walk forward. Taking small steps, fueled by determination but hindered by fear, she made her way to the entrance. Eyes fixed on the cement sign, Thirteen felt as if she was approaching the gates of hell.

Mike, Lucas, Nancy, and the investigators followed her, and the photographer ran alongside them, wild taking pictures. Just as Thirteen got to the doors, an investigator stepped ahead of her.

“I need to unlock it first. Then you can lead us to the basement.”

He produced a silver key from his pocket and unlocked the doors. He pushed one door open, trying to appear impressive. Thirteen responded by pushing the other door open herself and walking in alone.

Now, Thirteen faced the dark hallway. Tall, metal doors framed the walls, like columns in a dungeon. 

Images of Hawkins Middle School, with creeping vines crawling over the tiled floors and cinderblock walls flashed through Thirteen’s mind. A sudden hand on her shoulder made her jump.

“You okay?” Lucas asked. Relief washed over Thirteen. She nodded to him, and stared into the hall again. Mike and Nancy appeared on her other side. The four of them began to walk down the hall together.

Thirteen led them through the halls. Graffiti stained the walls, abandoned papers skidded across the floor, and scorch marks from the original 1994 fire were faint, but still visible in their path.

Each door was closed, except for one. Thirteen stood in the doorway. The room was warmer than the hallway, as sunlight streamed in from the open windows. A pile of desks had been shoved to the side of the room, burnt and broken. A fire extinguisher rested in the very center of the room, red and still.

“This is the room where she burnt me.”

After a few pictures of the room, Thirteen led the group further through the maze of her nightmares.

Thirteen stopped in front of a metal door. She traced her hand along the chipped, blue paint. She pulled the door open and flicked the lights on.That narrow staircase appeared and disappeared again in the flickering light.

Walking down the stairs, Thirteen’s mind was racing, but still blank. Images, words, memories, and colors flooded through her mind, abstract and vague. She pushed the cracked, wooden door open and looked at the first seventeen years of her life.

It was all still there. The cattle prod, the table, the handcuffs lying open, still attached to the metal bed frame. The TV stood in the corner, still holding the VHS of El and the red can. The door to the bathroom was left ajar, the light still on. At Thirteen’s feet, one shard of broken glass, still razor-sharp, was lying in a puddle of dried blood. In the bathroom, more broken glass from the soap bottle was still on the floor, just as Thirteen had left it.

It was all just as she had left it. The navy blue dresses, the clippers that had been used to shave her head, the dusty, grey machine that had tracked Thirteen’s brainwaves. The cracks in the wall, the pained humming of the overworked heater, the yellowed bedspread. The dripping shower, the repurposed file cabinets, the ghost of herself playing her pattern game to pass the time. 

Thirteen sat down on her bed while the others explored the basement. The only sounds were the murmurs of the investigators, the clicks of the camera, and the echoing footsteps on a floor that hadn’t held this many feet in at least 25 years.

Next came the hard part. Thirteen was interviewed, on tape, by Nancy and the two investigators. Nancy had prepared Thirteen for this, teaching her the watered down version of her own story. Nancy had already slipped the VHS tape of El into her purse, erasing the only proof of supernatural powers. Thirteen started her well-rehearsed monologue, telling the slightly fictionalized story of her abuse.

 

———

 

Dr. J. Taylor had become obsessed with the failed mind-control experiments supposedly done in the 1970s and 1980s at Hawkins Lab. Convinced that the human brain was capable of more than we know, she researched the experiments and planned to recreate them.

Dr. Taylor had chosen her subject at random, preying on an expecting mother, rather than kidnap an older child. This way, she could raise the child to be obedient and accustomed to living in only one room.

El Hopper was chosen randomly. She was in labor and had bypassed check-in. Never officially admitted to the hospital, she was in the hands of the recently-appointed obstetrician at Hawkins General Hospital, Dr. Taylor. 

Her plan was to take the baby and claim it was a miscarriage, but then, there were complications and El Hopper died in childbirth. Panicked, Dr. Taylor had gotten rid of her body and all evidence that El was at the hospital, and took the baby.

Her old high school, Longmont, had been abandoned for years, so that’s where Dr. Taylor raised the baby. As soon as she was old enough, she began to run tests on her subject, all based on internet speculation about the MKUltra experiments. She named her subject Thirteen, and even tattooed the number onto her wrist. 

The next seven years of Thirteen’s life was just failed experiment after failed experiment. As her captor grasped at straws, the abuse just got worse. On her first escape attempt, Dr. Taylor had taken an iron poker and burned the skin on Thirteen’s right arm. Thirteen was handcuffed to her bed, forced to continue the experiments with even less freedom. 

After her successful escape attempt, Thirteen went in search of her mother. She made her way back to Hawkins, where she met Lucas Sinclair, who reunited all of her mother’s friends. Thirteen was able to meet her father, her aunt, and her uncles. They took care of Thirteen, ready to protect her from Dr. Taylor, but not calling the authorities so they wouldn’t call attention to Thirteen’s location and draw her captor to her.

Dr. Taylor had driven back to Hawkins, desperate for proof of the “powers” that would prove that she hadn’t wasted her life on a fake story. She explored the abandoned Hawkins Lab, and found nothing. There, she either burned the lab down herself, out of anger, or accidentally set the fire and died inside. Her car was found outside the lab, but her body wasn’t.

 

———

 

After the long interview was over, Mike drove Lucas and Thirteen away. They went to Indianapolis, only 20 minutes away. Nancy stayed behind with the investigators, planning to drive Lucas’s car back to Hawkins after she was finished with the school.

“You did so good, Thirteen,” Lucas said, looking at Thirteen in the backseat. She had her new, red jacket over her dress, the hood over her messy hair. Thirteen stared out the window, in a dissociative state. Seeing that basement again hadn't made her angry or sad. She was just numb.

In Indianapolis, they met up with Steve, at his favorite restaurant. The three men talked over their pub food and beers, but Thirteen sat completely still, sipping her root beer and feeling that numbness in her veins, like the staticky, grey screen on an old TV. 

It wasn’t until they got back to the apartment, where Nancy had been waiting with Lucas’s car, that Thirteen started to feel like herself again. Nancy read aloud some snippets of her article, though Thirteen only pretended to listen.

As she went to sleep that night, Thirteen whispered to herself in the darkness. 

“My mom was not chosen by accident. I wasn’t put through those tests by a crazy woman. I am not powerless. I am not numb. I will wake up tomorrow like any other day, and I will feel normal. I know what really happened to me, and I know my anger is earned. I am fire.”


	36. The Name

On June 30, 2018, Thirteen woke up to the sun pouring in through her window. Her mind busy with the foggy details of her strange dream, she almost forgot what the date was. But in an instant, the months of anticipation that built up in her brain released like a broken dam. She hopped out of bed and tore into the living room.

There, she inhaled the glorious scent of her specially requested chip pancakes and orange juice breakfast. Her plate was already waiting for her at her usual spot on the table. Thirteen scrambled into her chair and read the words spelled out in chocolate chips across her plate.

“Happy Birthday,” she read aloud, grinning. Although she could only read basic words so far, Dustin had taught her these words in this week’s FaceTime lesson. 

“Yes! Happy Birthday!” Mike exclaimed. He placed a small, unlit, pink-striped candle in the center of her pile of pancakes. Thirteen focused on the wick, and with a small pop, the candle was lit.

“Make a wish, then blow the candle out,” Mike reminded her. He held his phone up, recording her first birthday celebration. Thirteen stared at the small fire for another second, then blew it out, watching the dainty smoke float from the blackened wick.

The family enjoyed their breakfast together, talking about the big day ahead of them. This day was more than a birthday for Thirteen. This was the day that Nancy’s article would be released. Mike had already read it to Thirteen weeks earlier, but now, all of Hawkins and all of the country would know about the pain she had endured. 

The third event that would make this day unforgettable was that today was the day that Thirteen would meet her grandmother _and_ see her grandfather again. After a visit to Hopper in the nursing home, Mike and Nancy had made plans to go to their mom’s house, and Nancy would have her read the article. Then, they would introduce her to Thirteen.

The idea of having a grandmother was thrilling to Thirteen. As a kid, Dr. Taylor had taught her what a grandmother was, by reading her stories about jolly old ladies who baked cookies for their grandkids. Thirteen’s heart beat with excitement and anxiety at the thought of meeting more family.

Thirteen got dressed to leave for the nursing home, then Karen Wheeler’s house, putting on her special birthday outfit. Expecting an exceptionally hot day, she wore her trusty orange headband, her new sandals, and her red shorts. Her favorite part of this outfit was the shirt. Will had sent it from Chicago, his birthday gift to her. It was a simple oversized t-shirt that he had tie-dyed a light yellow and baby pink. In the center of the shirt, Will had embroidered a fantastic, swirling fire design, using what seemed like a hundred different hues of orange, red, yellow, pink, and white.

“Thirteen, come on! Time to go!” Mike’s voice yelled from the living room, as Thirteen completed her look. She stood in front of the bathroom mirror, simultaneously applying her trademarked pink eyeshadow and messing with her growing hair that was just long enough to form little waves and curls.

“I’m almost ready!” Thirteen shouted from the bathroom.

“Be almost ready faster!” Mike called back. But he wasn’t ready either. Knowing that Thirteen, like most teenagers, would dawdle in the bathroom before leaving, he had another twenty seconds before Thirteen was ready. Mike spent that valuable twenty seconds tying a golden bow around Thirteen’s present.

Right on schedule, Thirteen opened the bathroom door and stepped into the living room. She looked at the present in his arms with surprise.

“Dad, I told you you didn’t need to get me anything! The furniture and stuff for my room was enough,” she said, but Mike saw the curiousity in her eyes. 

“Yeah, I know. But I didn’t listen,” Mike laughed. He passed the present to his daughter and watched her happily undo the golden ribbon and rip off the wrapping paper. The cardboard box was thin, like the box her framed picture from Jonathan had been in, but this was much lighter. She opened the box and peered inside, not seeing anything.

“It’s empty,” she told her dad.

“No, it’s not,” Mike insisted, sneaking a smile at his phone, which was secretly recording. Thirteen shook the apparently empty box, hoping some spectacular gift would magically fall from inside. To her surprise, it did.

Two pieces of paper fell to the ground. Thirteen picked them up, looking confused at them. One paper was printed blue with bold, dark letters, something that Thirteen couldn’t read yet. She flipped to the other page, a tattered and folded piece of notebook paper. A thin handwriting was scribbled across the page, a mix between cursive and print. It was a worn list with two columns, with some words scratched out and some underlined and circled.

“Dad, I can’t read these,” Thirteen told him. Mike stepped forward, pointing over her shoulder to the list as he read.

“‘Baby Names. Boys. Gabriel, Daniel, Jackson, something scratched out, John, Matthew, with a circle around it, and James, with a question mark next to it.”

“What-“ Thirteen started, but Mike cut her off.

“Girls. Hannah, Emily is crossed out, Lauren, underlined Eleanor, Kali, Nancy, Maxine, Terry. Sarah, with a circle around it.”

“I don’t understand,” Thirteen groaned. What kind of birthday present was this? But Mike, patient as ever, explained the list.

“When me and your mom found out that we were having a baby, we decided that we wanted the gender to be a surprise. We agreed that we were going to wait until we met the baby to name it. But it looks like your mom broke that agreement. I found this stuffed into her old favorite book. She had already chosen a name for you.”

Thirteen gasped, unable to form any words or even thoughts. Her hand, tattooed with the number that she had accepted as her name, came to her mouth, shaking as she felt every emotion possible.

Mike placed the list on his desk, turning his attention to the second piece of paper. He read it aloud to his daughter, who was shifting her weight nervously and clasping her hands over her face, hiding her tears and her stunned expression.

“State of Indiana, certificate of birth. This certifies that according to the records of Indiana, _Sarah Eleanor Wheeler_ was born in Hawkins, Indiana, on June 30th, 2000. Child of Michael Wheeler and Jane Hopper.”

Sarah ran into her father’s arms, sobbing and laughing at the same time. Mike held her close, tears falling down his own cheeks. 

“I have a name,” she said, voice cracking.

Mike wiped the tears from her face and grabbed his phone, quickly sending the video to the Party’s group chat. He set the birth certificate and El’s list gently in his desk drawer, then turned to his daughter.

“Let’s go, Sarah.”

Sarah skipped along as she walked to the car, unable to shake her smile from her face.

The drive to the nursing home was quick, but with the windows down, the tears dried quickly from their eyes. Sarah climbed out of the car,and stared out of the lobby’s windows while Mike checked them in. He led her to Hopper’s room.

“Hey, kid,” Hopper said, grinning at Sarah. She knew he thought she was El again, but his smile was still welcomed.

“Hi,” she responded. Hopper reached a weak hand up to her head, ruffling her hair.

“You visit Mike again today, El?”

“Yeah, I did,” Sarah said, shooting a small smile to her father.

“You’re gonna see him soon. Real soon. I-” Hopper interrupted into fit of coughs, the souvenir of a bad smoking habit.

“It’s my birthday,” Sarah told her grandfather, after his coughs had subsided.

“Oh, is it? Happy birthday, kid.”

“Thanks.”

“Sarah? Time to go,” Mike said softly from the doorway. Hopper looked up at him, just noticing him for the first time.

“Who're you?” he asked, squinting up at Mike.

“Nobody,” Mike responded, as Sarah slipped out of the room.

“Nice to meet you, Nobody,” Hopper said weakly.

Mike and Sarah walked back through the nursing home, almost late to their next destination.

“I’m sorry you couldn’t get to know him more before he got sick. He was a good guy,” Mike was saying to his daughter as they drove off.

“I like him,” Sarah said confidently. “Even if he doesn’t know me.”

 

———

 

Just arriving at his childhood home, the first time in eighteen years, Mike let out a sigh. As he pulled the car into the driveway, Sarah sank down in her seat, hiding from her grandmother’s eyes which would surely be watching from the window.

“There you are,” Nancy hissed at her brother as he climbed out of the car. She had clearly been waiting in her new car for over ten minutes. “The article is posting in- Shit- Two minutes!” 

The pair of them walked to the front door, which opened right when they knocked. Karen Wheeler, whose white hair was curled perfectly and nice blouse was spotless, threw her arms around her son.

“Michael Wheeler, how dare you! How dare you not contact your mother in eighteen years! Anything could have happened, you could have been _dead_ for all I knew-”

“Mom, it’s ok, I’m fine. I missed you,” Mike said. He hugged her again, scowling at Nancy, who was mouthing ‘One minute!’ over her shoulder.

“Where have you been?” Karen asked, holding her son’s face in her hands, as if she didn’t believe that it was really him. 

“We’ll explain everything, Mom. Let’s go inside, come on.”

He ushered his mother into the living room. She sat closely next to Mike, fixing his long, messy hair. Nancy, who had already visited her mom since moving back to Hawkins, went to grab Karen’s iPad from the kitchen. A few Facebook notifications appeared on the screen, which read _11:59_. Just as she picked up the iPad, the clock turned 12:00, and two post notifications from Nancy’s Twitter account and website popped up, announcing the release of her article.

“Mom, you need to read this article. It says everything. Nancy wrote it, see?” Mike told his mother, who looked curiously at him, but took the iPad from her daughter.

As she began to read, Sarah snuck out of Mike’s car. Ducking underneath the windows, she made her way to the front door, where she waited impatiently.

Karen Wheeler read about the abuse that her family had suffered. Tears appeared in her eyes several times throughout the story. She kept looking up at Nancy and Mike, wanting an explanation, but quickly going back to the article. 

Nancy and Mike held hands, each supporting the other. This was Nancy’s best work yet. It was heartfelt, personal, and it didn’t hold anything back, or at least it didn’t _seem_ to hold anything back.

Karen finished the article, looking up at her kids, almost speechless. 

“El… El’s really dead?”

Mike nodded, feeling a pang in his heart. He had no idea that his mother had cared so deeply for her daughter-in-law.

“And y-you… You have a daughter? Sarah?” Karen asked, tears falling down her face freely now.

“She’s outside. Can we let her in? Are you ready to meet her?” Nancy asked gently. Karen didn’t respond, but slowly stood up. She brushed past her kids and walked to the door. With a deep breath, she pulled the door open, revealing the face of her granddaughter.

Sarah looked at her grandmother, a weak smile on her face. Karen stared back.

“Did you really go through all that?” she quietly asked.

“And more,” Sarah admitted, more honestly than Karen knew. Her grandmother pulled her into a hug, soft and warm. 

Back in the living room, Karen sat sandwiched between her son and granddaughter. Nancy sat nearby, already reading the comments on her article.

“Could I see the tattoo?” Karen asked, speaking more shyly than Mike had ever seen her. Sarah nodded and pushed her bracelets back, a trick she had learned from Will, to show her tattoo.

“Wow,” Karen breathed, heartbroken, but still intrigued by Sarah’s story. 

“Grandma,” Sarah started. “I was wondering…”

“Yes?”

“Could you bake me some cookies?” Sarah asked. Karen leaned back, a smile on her face.

“No, but _we_ could bake cookies together.”

The afternoon was spent baking and eating the most delicious cookies that Sarah had ever had. Just as they were about to leave, to get to Sarah’s birthday party, Mike stopped his mom.

“Hey mom, I was wondering if Sarah and I could go to the basement for a few minutes. Since El and I used to hang out down there, I wanted to show Sarah.”

“Of course. You know, I think that old blanket fort you used to sit in is still up,” Karen said.

“Really?” Mike asked, in mock surprise. But he quickly led Sarah to the basement stairs. She hesitated, remembering the horrible smell and decaying body that waited for her in the Upside Down. But Sarah shook that memory from her mind, and boldly stepped down the stairs, leading Mike.

Mike clicked the light on, illuminating the piles of cardboard boxes. Sarah looked around, pleased to note that the only smell present was the scent of dust. She weaved through the towers of cardboard, leading her father to the blanket fort. 

The sheets that hid the inside of the fort were eerily still. Mike’s shaking hand lifted up the sheet, folding it over the top of the desk. In a reveal that many would call anticlimactic, only a few pillows and blankets rested in the fort.

“Her head’s right there,” Sarah pointed to one pillow, the one that held her mother’s head in another dimension.

The family sat there together in silence. There was nothing that either of them could say to the empty space where El laid that would like they weren’t talking to a pile of pillows. Even if El could hear them, no profound speech would be enough. Instead they just sat, communicating in the silent way that El always had.

After minutes of that silence, Sarah spoke in a whisper.

“It’s time to go, Dad.”

Mike nodded, and Sarah stood up, then helped him to his feet. She started up the steps, but she heard Mike lean over and whisper something to the fort.

“I love you, El.”

 

———

 

Sarah’s 18th birthday party was a success. The park, home to a dozen picnic tables and a small playground, was the setting of her party. Rows of familiar faces lined up there, waiting for the birthday girl.

“Max! Dustin!” Sarah ran to greet them. 

“What about me?” a familiar voice asked.

“Will! Look, I’m wearing my shirt,” Sarah modeled for him. She went down the line, hugging the other members of the party.

“Steve’s over with his twins, making sure they don’t harass the other kids,” Jonathan pointed, his camera swinging around his neck. Sure enough, Steve’s kids were already climbing above the monkey bars and trying to run up the slides.

Max’s younger son kicked a soccer ball in circles around the playground, a fun pastime that was only enhanced when both twins began running after the ball.

“There’s Damien over there, by the snacks. He’s 15, close to your age,” Max pointed to her son, who appeared to be discreetly taking selfies.

“And my daughter is over by the water fountain, drawing,” Dustin said, grinning at Max. He was clearly proud of his kid for drawing instead of taking selfies, but Max just rolled her eyes.

As the sun set, the group enjoyed their picnic dinner and the huge, chocolate cake with Sarah’s name written across it in orange icing. After opening her presents, Sarah ran around, excitedly talking to Dustin’s, Max’s, and Steve’s wives, all of whom were so friendly and clearly tired of their spouses’ energy and bad jokes. Next she ran to play soccer with Max’s younger son, which quickly turned into a game of Monkey In The Middle with the twins. Sarah took pictures with Damien and talked about his school. She sat with Anne, Dustin’s daughter, talking about art and nature.

When the sky was dark, and only a few old streetlights lit up the park with a dim, coppery color, Mike passed out sparklers, which Sarah would secretly use her powers to light, a fun party trick that impressed the twins and baffled Damien.

“How do you do that? Seriously,” Damien asked. 

“Magic,” Sarah replied simply, as Anne laughed at the bewildered look on Damien’s face.

As it became later and later, the families had to leave the park. Steve’s family left early, making their journey back to Indianapolis. Then Max’s family left for the hotel, then Dustin’s. Damien, Anne, and Sarah were quick to swap Instagram usernames before their families made them leave. Sarah quickly downloaded Instagram on her iPad, eager to be included with her new friends.

Then, it was just Sarah, Mike, Nancy, Will, Jonathan, and Lucas left outside, as midnight was just about to hit. They all sat sleepily at a picnic table, enjoying the cool breeze and the fireflies in the night sky.

“So, how was your first real birthday, Sarah?” Jonathan asked.

“Perfect,” she said, leaning against Mike’s shoulder.

And she really meant it. It had been months since she met her family, fought Dr. Taylor, found her mother in the Upside Down, defeated the Mind Flayer, and closed the gate. Even though it was hard to go a day without some painful reminder of her trauma, and she now had to dodge the people in Hawkins who pointed and whispered, she didn’t mind. She was happy. She had a family, a room to herself, a name, and friends. She had a _life_.

Fire and fury still burned behind her eyes, just as they always had, but Sarah was in control. She inhaled that cold breeze, welcoming the goosebumps on her skin. She didn’t mind the heat, and she didn’t mind the cold.

Sarah, no longer bothered by the strange black mark on her arm, the 013 tattoo on her wrist, and the flecks of dried blood that always sat under her nose, whispered to herself in the last seconds of her eighteenth birthday.

“ _I’m fire and ice_.”


End file.
